


The Choice

by lastincurableromantic



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Amnesia, Character Study, Episode AU: s03e08-09 Human Nature/Family of Blood, Explicit Sex, F/M, Romance, Swearing, Universe Alteration, human!Nine, sick TARDIS
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-02
Updated: 2017-10-28
Packaged: 2018-02-07 04:27:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 36
Words: 130,934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1885128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lastincurableromantic/pseuds/lastincurableromantic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After GitF, the TARDIS brings the Doctor, Rose and Mickey back to Earth to solve an emergency involving the TARDIS herself. But when they see a familiar face, the face of someone who should not exist, they realize the crisis is much deeper than they thought and is one that could endanger the Doctor's very existence.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue—London, 1 January 2007

**Author's Note:**

> I hadn't intended to start posting this yet, but I found I couldn't resist.

**Prologue—London, 1 January 2007**

Six months ago…

_Fire. Searing heat. An inferno of red and yellow and orange rushing through the deep red grasses of the plains. Red flames igniting the trees. The delicate silver leaves ablaze, turning the trees into torches that illuminated the night sky._

_Screams. Running._

_Monstrous metal creatures of silver and black with glowing eye stalks. Shooting beams of energy. Killing everything in sight._

_“Exterminate! Exterminate!”_

_Disjointed faces. Circling, swirling in front of his eyes. Voices. Echoing…_

_An elderly man. Straight white hair. Beaky nose._

_“One day I shall come back. Yes, I shall come back...”_

_Dark, straight hair. An expressive face._

_“Jamie, stay with me, don't wander off.”_

_White hair. Piercing eyes._

_“Courage isn't just a matter of not being frightened, you know. It's being afraid and doing what you have to do anyway.”_

_Brown curls. Floppy hat. Lots of teeth._

_“Just touch these two strands together, and the Daleks are finished... Have I that right?”_

_Straight blond hair. A young face. Pleasant features._

_“Brave heart, Tegan.”_

_Blond curls. Haughty, arrogant. Filled with righteous indignation._

_“Power-mad conspirators, Daleks, Sontarans, Cybermen - they're still in the nursery compared to us. Ten million years of absolute power. That's what it takes to be really corrupt.”_

_Dark hair. A Panama hat._

_“Every great decision creates ripples. Like a huge boulder dropping in a lake. The ripples merge and rebound off the banks in unforeseeable ways. The heavier the decision, the larger the waves, the more uncertain the consequences.”_

_Dark curly hair. A grave expression._

_“It's not my war. I will have no part of it.”_

_An elderly man. A warrior._

_“No more!”_

_Explosions. Fire. Fire everywhere. The ground on fire. The sky on fire. The sounds of screaming—_

_Suddenly cut off. Silence. The silence of space. The silence of the Void._

_The silence of the dead._

_Other images swam before his eyes. New faces. New voices._

_Plastic people._

_A hand in his. A glimpse of blonde hair._

_“Run!”_

_“Are they students?”_

_“Nice to meet you… Run for your life!”_

_“The turn of the Earth… I can feel it. Now forget me…”_

_“It wasn’t my fault! I couldn't save your world! I couldn't save any of them!”_

_Someone swinging on a chain, saving him. Another glimpse of blonde hair. A pretty face. Warm brown eyes and a generous mouth._

_“You were useless in there. You'd be dead if it wasn't for me.”_

_“Yes, I would… Uh... I don't know... you could come with me.”_

_“You could come with me…”_

_“You could come with me…”_

The feel of something repetitively poking him in the ribs drew him slowly back to consciousness. Gradually he realized he was lying face down on something hard. Rough. Asphalt. Cutting into the side of his face.

“Oi, mate. Wakey, wakey,” said a male voice.

The poking became harder, more insistent. He opened his eyes a crack. Even that slight movement made his head pound. Despite lying horizontally, he was struck with a wave of dizziness and nausea. 

“Come on, time to wake up.” This was a different voice. Lighter, younger. Feminine.

He wondered where he was, and he opened his eyes wider. Someone, probably the person poking him, was shining a torch in his face. Through the glare, he could see a series of bins in front of him. Garbage lay on the ground around them, as if someone couldn’t be bothered to actually lift up the lid of the bin and put it inside.

He turned his head. Black shoes led to black trousers led to radio equipped utility belts led to bright yellow rain slickers and black helmets. Police officers. One, the female—petite with dark brown skin and closely cropped hair—was looking at him with a frown, while the other, the male—large with a red, beefy face—was still prodding him with a baton. 

“Ow,” he complained.

“Sir, are you hurt?” the policewoman asked. 

He groaned. _Now I am_ , he thought.

“Sir, have you been mugged?” she asked.

"He hasn't been mugged, Seward," her partner said. "New Year's, unconscious in an alley, he's sleepin' it off. And now he needs to go home." The policeman turned back to him. "So you need to get up and go home, mate."

"I don't smell any alcohol on him, Rutgers," Seward told him.

"Doesn't mean anything," Rutgers said. "Alcohol, drugs… whatever he took, he needs to sleep it off at home, not in the alley."

"Shouldn't he go to A & E?"

"Not if he's not hurt," her partner replied. "And I don't see a mark on him."

As they spoke, he felt an overwhelming wave of drowsiness. His eyes drifted closed.

"Oi, don't go back to sleep!" Rutgers said, poking him again. "Wake up."

"Sir, can you tell us your name?"

He opened his eyes again. The policewoman, Seward, was kneeling over him now, concern written all over her face.

"Can you tell us your name?" she repeated. "Is there someone we can call?"

He opened his mouth to answer… and realized he didn't remember. Not whether he had any family, not where he was from, not how he had ended up in the alley. Not even his name. Nothing.

"Told you he was drunk," Rutgers said.

He couldn't argue with that. He didn't remember, so for all he knew he had been.

"Check his ID," the officer continued.

Seward reached forward as if she was going to check his pockets, and he held up a hand. Slowly he pushed himself up to a sitting position and patted down his jacket. All he could find was a slim wallet in an interior pocket. He handed it to her.

"Looks like he's… John Smith from Manchester," she said. She handed the wallet to her partner.

"Manchester, eh?" Rutgers said. The officer examined its contents before handing the wallet back to him. "You're a long way from home."

He flipped open the wallet. Only one thing in it, a driver's license made out in the name of John Smith, Manchester, with the picture of a man with short cropped hair and a big nose and big ears. Him, he guessed. Otherwise there was nothing. No money, no credit card, no NHS card…

But there was something funny about the driver's license. For just a second, he could have sworn it was just a blank piece of paper…

"Yeah, guess I am," he replied. He put the wallet back in his pocket.

"So what's your story? Drunk or mugged?"

John tried to remember, but he couldn't. The name sounded familiar, but odd at the same time, like it could be his but really wasn't. But until he could figure out who he was, it was as good a name as any.

"If you were drunk, we could let you go with a warning," Rutgers continued. "But if you were mugged, we'd have to bring you in to file a report. Now which was it? Drunk or mugged?"

There was only one answer he could give. If they brought him in to file a report, he'd have to admit he didn't remember who he was, and that could mean a stint in the local psychiatric ward.

No. If he was sectioned, he'd never figure out who he was.

"New Year's," he said, remembering that the officer had mentioned it earlier. "Was celebratin'. Had a couple too many at the local and got pissed. Was on my way home, but obviously didn't make it."

Rutgers nodded sharply. "Right. We'll be on our way, then. And next time, make sure you head home before you're so drunk you can't walk."

He began to head out the alley, but Seward hung back for a moment.

"Are you going to be able to make it home all right?" she asked.

"Absolutely," he told her.

She nodded. John could tell she didn't believe him, but she stood and began to walk out of the alley anyway. Just before she left, he stopped her.

"Hey," he said impulsively. "What year is it?"

She stared at him. "It's 1 Jan, 2007. Are you sure you're alright?"

"Don't worry about me," he told her. "I'm fantastic. Absolutely fantastic."

She gave him another disbelieving look before turning and following her partner out of the alley.

John gave them a several minute head start before he stood up. His entire body ached, as if it had been pummeled repeatedly. Maybe he had been mugged after all, he thought. Without knowing where to go, he slowly staggered out of the alley, never noticing the tall blue box he was leaving behind.


	2. Chapter One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I want to thank the fantastic lunarsilverwolfstar for her help with the Spanish in this. I told her approximately what I wanted to say and what she came up with was so brilliant I couldn't bear to cut a single word.

**Chapter One—London, 7 July 2007**

Present day…

_Long blonde hair. Big brown eyes. A generous mouth…_

John woke with a start to the sound of screaming coming from outside his window. Curses were being hurled back and forth, or maybe they were being volleyed. It was almost like a tennis match. The neighbors were rowing again. There was always someone rowing in this block of flats. This time it was the unmarried couple, Rita and Chuck, two over and one down.

He tried to get back to sleep, to recapture the elusive dream. He dreamt about a lot of things ever since he had woken up in the alley on New Year’s. His dreams were strange and bizarre, all about alien planets and stars, about fire and war, about the color blue and gigantic pepper pots of all things. But he mostly dreamt about the girl. The girl’s face haunted him for some reason, both when he was asleep and awake. He still didn’t properly remember anything, not even his real name, but the girl was the closest to an actual memory as he came. Maybe he knew her from somewhere. He could almost recall what she looked like when he was awake, but not quite. But he could when he was sleeping. Her face was clearest to him in dreams. With thoughts of her, he began to drift off…

Rita let out a string of expletives in a variety of languages, and John was jerked awake again. For a second, as Rita shouted, he wondered if she had been in the navy. That was the only possible way she could have learned a few of those words, and how to pronounce them in exactly that way. She even used the right syntax.

John groaned as he glanced over at the clock. Half four in the morning. Too early for him to get up. Too early in fact for _them_ to be up. They were never up before eleven. This must be the tail end of whatever had been going on between them last night.

There was a lull in the arguing. Thanking all the gods of the Greek pantheon, he pulled the pillow back over his head and tried to get back to sleep again. A fool’s errand, he realized, as Rita almost immediately began to swear again. That was followed by a loud crash. Soup pot against something hard and probably breakable by the sound of it. Not the window. That would have shattered. This was either the drywall or perhaps the door. The doors were thin, easily broken, particularly if it was an interior door. And as part-time maintenance man in return for a reduction in the rent, he’d probably be the one who’d have to fix it.

With a heavy sigh, he hauled himself out of bed, slipped on his jeans and a lightweight jumper, and headed out the door.

A crowd had gathered to watch the spectacle. There were people everywhere: on the balcony, on the landing, in the courtyard, even on the balconies of the other buildings. 

“This is better than last night’s EastEnders,” he heard someone say as he headed down the stairs to the floor below.

“What isn’t?” someone else replied. “Last night’s episode was horrible.”

With an eye roll, John pushed his way through the crowd to the arguing couple. Rita was standing in the doorway to her flat, clad only in a thigh length t-shirt and fuzzy slippers, while Chuck, standing against the railing, was dressed in a buttoned down shirt, jeans, and some sort of high-priced trainers. As John drew close to them, he got a whiff of cigs and stale beer coming from Chuck’s general direction. 

“Oi!” he shouted. “Knock it off!” At the sound of his voice the arguing couple both quieted for a moment, almost as if they hadn’t realized they were the center of a spectacle. “Rita, Chuck, I’ll thank you to save the domestics for a reasonable hour. Other people have to get up in the morning.”

Rita tossed her long, black hair over her shoulder. “John,” she said. “That… that…” Her dark brown eyes flashed angrily as she gestured at her boyfriend. She slipped into Spanish. “Este pinche hijo de puta que no vale nada esta dentrando a las cuatro de la mañana y el cabron ni tiene la dignidad que dar una buena escusa.” She became more and more animated as she spoke. “¡Estoy segura que esta cogiendo una puta por ay!” She looked at her boyfriend in disgust. “Su verga ni esta tan grande para que todas estas putas se tiren en su camino.”

“Más despacio, por favor,” John replied in fluent and unaccented Spanish. “And in English this time. My Spanish is a bit rusty.”

“This… piece of shit… has been shagging the waitresses down at the pub, I’m sure of it,” she spat. “Then the bloody wanker has the nerve to come back here—at 4 am—and tell me it’s all in my mind!” 

John turned to Chuck, a young man whose pointed nose and greasy brown hair made him look a bit like a weasel. “Is this true? You been sleepin’ around on her?”

“Yes, it is!” Rita interjected before Chuck could answer. “But why they’d bother with him, I have no idea. The son of a bitch can’t even get it up half the time.”

“Shut up, you slag!” he yelled. He lunged at her, and John caught him with one hand. 

“Knock it off!” John ordered. Then he pulled a face as he caught a whiff of more than just beer and cigarettes. “What is that smell?” He took a big sniff and grimaced. “You definitely need a shower, for one thing. And for the second, unless you’ve taken to wearing women’s perfume, she’s right.”

Chuck shook John’s hand off his shoulder. “You’ve got it all wrong…” His voice trailed off and he didn’t continue.

John raised an eyebrow. “Seriously. ‘You’ve got it all wrong.’ That’s what you’re goin’ with?” He tapped his nose. “If there’s one thing this nose is good for, it’s smellin’ shite, and I’m smellin’ it now. And as for you,” he said, turning back to Rita, “I don’t know why you put up with him. If I were you, instead of throwing pots against the door, I’d be throwing his stuff out into the courtyard.”

“She can’t do that!” Chuck protested.

“Oi! I’m talking here!” John said to him. He turned back to Rita. “I’d toss him and his sorry arse out onto the street. You shouldn’t put up with that kind of behavior.”

“He’s right,” said an old woman who lived next door. She was wearing a floor-length dressing gown patterned with sunflowers, and her snow white hair was pinned up in pin curls. “I threw my second husband out for that and never looked back. Or was it my third…”

“It was your third, Gladys,” her sister answered. She was dressed almost identically in a floral dressing gown, only hers had daisies. She wore her steel grey hair loose around her shoulders. “Remember? He was the one who you told me always ate crisps in bed.”

“You’re right, Irene,” Gladys answered. “My second one was the one who—”

“Anyway,” John interjected before the women could continue to reminisce. “You,” he pointed to Chuck, “shut the hell up and find somewhere else to be, and you,” he pointed to Rita, “stop yelling and throwing things. And the rest of you lot, go back to your flats. I’m headed back to bed, and I don’t want to hear another word out of any of you.” 

He glared at the crowd for good measure, and slowly they trailed off. With another glare at Rita and Chuck, John returned to his own flat.

Back in his bedroom, he stripped down to vest and pants and crawled back into bed. But he couldn’t sleep. _Damn_ , he thought, getting back out of bed after tossing and turning for almost half an hour. _Might as well get up._

After showering, he stared at himself in the mirror. For a split second for some odd reason he had expected to see a different face. “You’re definitely losin’ it,” he said to his reflection. He considered shaving and then decided against it. _Why bother_ , he thought. He had just shaved yesterday. Besides, no one cared what he looked like. Not even him. 

He returned to the bedroom. As he dressed, this time in a denim work shirt rather than a jumper, his eye caught the notebook and the sketchpad that he kept on the bedside table. He’d been trying to record images of his dreams, see if by analyzing them that he could somehow trigger his memories, but so far it hadn’t helped. He had drawn rough sketches of metal men and spaceships and disjointed faces, but most often he drew the blonde girl from his dreams.

He sat down on the edge of the bed, picked up the sketchpad and a pencil and began to work on the drawing he had started the day before.

Long blonde hair, big brown eyes, a wide smile… Her nose. He couldn’t quite remember what her nose looked like. Cute, he thought. Feminine. Nothing like the hawkish beak he’d been born with.

He sketched in a smallish nose. Dissatisfied with the results, he erased and began again. Still not right. He frowned. Maybe work on her ears. Her ears… smallish, well, smaller than his at any rate. Then again, whose weren’t?

And for the next two hours he worked on a sketch of a girl he couldn’t remember ever having met before. But a girl, if she was real, who could possibly hold the key to whoever he was.

~oOo~

Mickey Smith sat on the jump seat in the TARDIS control room watching the Doctor at the mushroom shaped console in the center of the room. He was programming in their next destination: an alien planet, he had promised. One with a purple sky and green clouds and the best food this side of the galaxy. It might have been interesting, if he hadn’t been talking about it for fifteen minutes straight without taking a breath.

Bored with listening to his rambling monologue, Mickey glanced over at Rose. She stood nearby, leaning against one of the coral struts that stretched from the floor to the arching ceiling high overhead. Her arms were crossed, face carefully schooled to be completely expressionless. Having known her since childhood, and even dated her for a short time, Mickey knew that expression well. She was upset. But not the kind of upset that would result in a row. No, she was hurt. And he knew exactly why.

Ever since they had left the spaceship that had held portals to eighteenth century France, the tension between the Doctor and Rose had been so thick you could cut it with a knife. Oh, they were both ignoring it, pretending it didn’t exist, but neither of them were fooling him, or each other.

“Rose,” the Doctor said, “come here for a moment.” As she moved to stand next to him, he gestured at the controls in front of her. “Hold this button down while I begin the materialization process.”

With a small nod she silently obeyed. 

Mickey wished she’d just yell, slap him, throw things… just something, anything rather than being quiet like this. This wasn’t the Rose Tyler he knew.

Oh, this is bad, he thought. The last time he had seen her at this way was…

The TARDIS gave a sudden lurch and an ominous sounding bell began to toll. Its deep bong bong bong echoed through the TARDIS so loudly that Mickey could feel the reverberations in his bones. The Doctor lunged at the controls, and Mickey saw something on the Doctor’s face he had never seen before: panic.

“What? What is it? What’s goin’ on?” he shouted.

“Somethin’ bad, Mick,” Rose shouted back.

“That’s the Cloister Bell. Only rings in dire circumstances. Looks like we’re gonna have to put off your visit to the Rhomulian cluster a little bit longer,” the Doctor said loudly, trying to be heard over the sound of the bell.

The TARDIS shook violently and jerked to a sudden stop. Rose and the Doctor, who had been hanging onto handholds built into the control panels, were thrown against the console. Mickey hurriedly grabbed onto the edge of the seat, barely preventing himself being flung to the floor. 

The Doctor and Rose rushed out the TARDIS door. Mickey trailed behind, bumping into Rose who had stopped short. Behind them the Cloister Bell fell silent.

The TARDIS had landed on the pavement of a deserted city street. Its back was flush against a tall graffiti covered fence surrounding a dilapidated building, while across the street was a vacant lot, filled with weeds, abandoned car parts, empty beer cans, and other, less appealing things. Tall concrete buildings less than a block away loomed overhead, whereas in the distance, they could hear the sounds of city traffic and of a radio blaring rock music. They all immediately recognized where they were.

“Is this some sorta joke?” Mickey asked.

“We’re on the estate,” Rose exclaimed in disbelief. “What are we doing here?”

“I don’t know,” the Doctor answered. He was walking around in a circle, staring in puzzlement at their surroundings. “And this is no joke. The Cloister Bell doesn’t ring for no reason.”

“Well, it looks pretty peaceful to me,” Mickey said. “No plastic people walking the street, no alien ships overhead. So where’s the big emergency?”

“I don’t know!” the Doctor snapped. He turned and strode back into the TARDIS. Rose shrugged, and she and Mickey followed him.

Inside, the Doctor was squinting at a display screen covered with the circles and other geometric shapes that Mickey knew was the written form of the Doctor’s own language. Muttering under his breath, he pulled his glasses out of a pocket and put them on. He shook his head.

“I don’t get it. The TARDIS says that the emergency is here, in this place and time, and what’s more, involves the TARDIS herself.” He moved closer to the screen and his forehead furrowed. “And me,” he said in surprise. He took off his glasses, shoved them back in his pocket and turned to them.

“Well, we can’t leave here until we figure out what’s going on,” he said irritably. “Rose, why don’t you and Mickey look around a bit, see if there’s anything going on out there while I examine the TARDIS a bit more.”

Rose stared at him for a moment and then bit her lower lip, a gesture Mickey recognized as meaning she was nervous, but he couldn’t imagine why: they were on the estate. 

Then the penny dropped.

“You’re leavin’ us here, aren’t you?” he accused. “Just like you did with Sarah Jane. You’re tryin’ to trick us into leavin’ the TARDIS, and then you’re just gonna take off.”

The Doctor’s jaw dropped, and he gaped at them. “Is that what you think?” He turned to Rose. “Both of you? You think this is just some ploy to abandon you here?” Rose didn’t answer. “But I told you…” He stared at her. “I am not leaving you behind. Even if I wanted to—which I don’t,” that part was accompanied by a shake of his finger at both of them, “I wouldn’t be able to, because with the TARDIS in the state she’s in, she wouldn’t take off anyway.” 

He fell silent. He searched Rose’s face and looked troubled at what he found there. “Mickey, would you excuse us for a minute, please?”

Mickey looked at Rose, who nodded. As he left he caught snatches of their conversation.

“Honestly, Rose, how could you think—”

“Seriously? How could I think anything else after you—”

Evidently he had been wrong, Mickey thought. They _were_ going to row.

With a small smirk of satisfaction, Mickey shut the door behind him to give them some privacy.

~oOo~

When Rose left the TARDIS a few minutes later, Mickey was waiting for her. 

“So?” he prompted.

She didn’t answer. Instead she stalked off down the street. Mickey had to jog to catch up with her.

“What happened?” he asked. “What did he say?”

“Don’t want to talk about it,” she told him. She didn’t look at him. “Just need to get out of there for a bit.”

“This isn’t the way to your mum’s,” he said. “And it’s not the way to my flat either. So where are we headed?”

“I… I don’t know,” she said. She came to a stop and turned to him. “I don’t want to face Mum right now, and I don’t want to go back to the TARDIS either.”

“Alright,” he said, thinking fast. “I have an idea. He was gonna take us to eat, and he didn’t. Let’s go ourselves then. Leave him here to do… whatever the hell he doin’ in there.”

“Mick…” Rose said. “I’m not really hungry.”

“Well, I am,” he told her. “So we’re goin’.” And with that, he took her arm and pulled her down the street.

Ten minutes later they were sitting at a small table at the back of Mickey’s favorite pub on the estate, a table they had been very lucky to get. When they had arrived, they had discovered it was Saturday at lunchtime and the place was packed. As was typical, on the telly that was over the bar there was a game on, but for once Mickey wasn’t trying to keep sight of it. Instead, unlike every time they had gone to the pub while they had been dating, he was entirely focused on Rose.

“Honestly, Rose, I don’t know why you let him treat you like that,” he said.

“He doesn’t treat me any different than anyone else,” she told him.

“And that’s part of the problem. He should,” Mickey said. “Besides, he didn’t treat that fancy French bint that way.”

“He had to save her,” she said. “This is what he does.” 

At this Mickey rolled his eyes. 

“Seriously, Mick. Those robots weren’t supposed to be there. And I looked her up. She was really important in France’s history, influenced the revolution and stuff. If it wasn’t for her, who knows what would have happened. It’s his job to fix things like this.”

“Was it his job to snog her? And then brag about it? He threw it in your face, Rose. Not to mention the fact that who knows what the two of them got up to while he left us on the ship. He treated you like crap. Shitty boyfriend he turned out to be. Almost as bad as Jimmy.”

Rose gave him a look that said _don’t go there_. “I told you, Mick, we aren’t like that. We’re just friends. Who he snogs is none of my business.”

“‘We aren’t like that, Mick,’” he said mockingly. “‘We’re just friends, Mick.’” 

“We are!” she insisted.

“Yeah, right. Pull the other one while you’re at it. If you’re just friends, I’m the Queen.”

“Nice to meet you, your Majesty.”

They were interrupted by a waiter carrying a heavily laden tray. Big baskets of deep fried cod and chips and tall pints of light gold cider were placed on the table in front of them. Mickey immediately tucked in, eating with gusto, shoving huge forkfuls of food in his mouth. Meanwhile, Rose picked at the basket in front of her. 

“Let’s just say I believe you,” Mickey said around a mouthful of food. “Which I don’t. But even if I did, he still abandoned us on that spaceship.”

“Mickey, he told me straight off, on one of our very first trips, that it was a new morality out there. I had to get used to it or go home.” 

He shook his head and stared at her. “So that’s it then? Get used to it or go home? And you’re okay with that?”

“It’s worth it. Getting a chance to see what’s out there… it’s worth it,” she said. 

“Rose, he abandoned us on that ship. Not just you. Us. We almost got killed by those robot things while he was off gettin’ drunk.”

“He didn’t know—” 

The crowd in front of the telly let out a cheer, but neither of them paid attention.

“Maybe not,” Mickey said, raising his voice loudly enough to be heard. “But that’s not the point. You might be able to live with that, but I can’t. So if I have to get used to it or go home, I guess I should go home.” His eyes widened, as if he was shocked at the words that had come out of his mouth.

She blinked. “You’re… you’re gonna stay here?”

“I, uh, I guess I am,” he said.

Rose bit her lip. She hadn’t initially wanted Mickey to come with, but now that he wasn’t going to travel with them anymore, she realized she didn’t want him to leave. “I… I can’t stay,” she said. 

“I know.”

“I’m gonna keep traveling with him as long as he’ll let me. I can’t imagine anything that would make me want to stay here.” She looked up to see him frowning at her. “I’m sorry, Mick. I didn’t mean…”

“No,” he said. “We talked about this before. It’s been over between us for a while. It’s been over since that first day the two of you met, probably. Just one question though. Are the two of you really just friends?”

She nodded. “Yeah. Just friends.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

“Why?”

“What do you mean, ‘why’?” she asked.

“I mean, it’s obvious how much he cares about you, and I know how you feel about him…” he said. “Wait a minute. Does _he_ know how you feel about him?”

“Yeah. Maybe… I don’t know.” She shrugged. “But it doesn’t really matter. He doesn’t do that sort of thing.”

“Oh, yes, he does,” Mickey argued. “I think Reinette proved that.”

She leaned across the table and slugged him in the arm. “‘S not what I meant. He can, he told me he can… don’t ask,” she said, holding up a hand and cutting him off before he could say anything. “He just doesn’t do… relationships. Too tough on him. He’s lost so many people, he told me so, and I don’t think he can bear to lose anyone else. Or maybe it’s that he can’t do relationships. Thing is, he’s alien. He looks human, but he’s not. He doesn’t react the same way to things as we do, doesn’t think the same way we do.”

“What if he was human, Rose?” Mickey asked. “What then?”

She took a deep breath and let it out in a rush. “I don’t know. But it doesn’t matter. It’s not gonna happen. It’s not like he can just up and turn himself human. And why would he want to anyway?”

Mickey didn’t have an answer to that.

Another loud cheer came from the front of the pub, and this time he strained his neck to try and see the match over Rose’s head. 

“Go ahead,” she said indulgently. She jerked her head towards the television. “Might as well get caught up.”

Mickey grinned. “You’re the best, babe,” he said, picking up his basket and cider and carrying it to the bar. 

With a sigh, she sprinkled more vinegar on her food and speared a chip with her fork. It was only halfway to her mouth before he was back.

“You gonna eat your fish?” he asked. He didn’t bother waiting for a reply, just grabbed it with his fingers and put it in his basket.

She rolled her eyes. “Not anymore,” she replied. 

He grinned and gave her a kiss on the cheek before returning to the bar.

~oOo~

Later, after they had both finished eating and, more importantly, when the match was over, Mickey and Rose wandered back out onto the street.

“So you’re really gonna do this then?” she asked. “You’re really gonna stay?”

“Yeah, I think so,” he said. “I mean, it’s exciting an’ all, the aliens, the adventures, the runnin’ for your life, but it just doesn’t do it for me like it does for you.”

“It’s not always like that, Mick,” she told him. “There’s lots and lots of times when we’re just traveling, just going new places, seeing new things. Like that planet he was going to take us to.” She bumped his shoulder with hers. “Come on with us when we go. You’ll see.”

After a moment, Mickey shook his head. “My flat is still here. I’m gonna go see if I can get my old job back. After all we’ve only been gone, what, a day or two?”

They rounded a corner and stopped in shock when they saw the shop. It looked different somehow, newer almost. The sign in front had received a fresh coat of paint and the plate-glass windows were sparkling. From where they stood, it looked like the repair bays of the garage were full. The tiny car park next to the shop was filled, as was the street in front.

“Wow, I’ve never seen it so busy,” Mickey said in amazement. “For sure I’ll get my job back.”

Rose didn’t mention her suspicions that the changes that had taken place had to have taken more than a day or two to make.

The inside of the shop was as packed as the outside. Cars were indeed in every bay, and the waiting area in the office was packed with people. They made their way to the reception desk where the receptionist was on the telephone. 

The receptionist/bookkeeper/office manager was Abhirati Mudali, the wife of the owner. Her name—which could be loosely translated as mother of five hundred children—suited her, as they had five children at home and appeared to have a sixth on the way. And very soon by the look of her. 

“Mrs. Mudali,” Mickey said. “Where’s Mr. Mudali?”

“I don’t know,” she replied crossly. “Somewhere in there.” She gestured vaguely with her hand at the interior of the garage. 

“Can we go find him?”

She shrugged. “You can try,” she said. As they turned to leave, she called after them. “And if you do manage to find him, tell him we need more help here unless he wants to have this one born in the office rather than in hospital!”

Like the office, the garage itself was also a study in chaos. People were everywhere. As Mickey searched for his former boss, Rose trailed along behind him. It was either that or go back to the TARDIS or go to her mum’s flat, and she really wasn’t in the mood to see either the Doctor or her mum yet. As much as she had protested to Mickey that she wasn’t upset by the business with Madame de Pompadour, it did bother her that the Doctor had been so quick to leave them behind on the spaceship. Not to mention how much it hurt that he had asked Reinette to go on a trip with them. She’d never forget the look on his face when he found out she had died waiting for him. As much as he denied it, she knew he had been crushed.

The business with Reinette following immediately after running into Sarah Jane just drove home the point to her that she was merely one in a long parade of people—women—in his life. And despite his claims she was different, that he’d never leave her behind, the truth was he _had_ left her behind, her and Mickey both, almost immediately after that. That told her that not only was she just one of many, she wasn’t even an important one.

She tamped down the jealousy that was again threatening to overwhelm her. She had always been jealous of the attention he had shown other women, right from the very first, starting with Jabe at the end of the Earth. But her feelings for him weren’t the reason she was staying with him. That part of what she had told Mickey was the truth. Reinette had had it backwards. The Doctor wasn’t worth the monsters. The chance of traveling the stars in the TARDIS was worth whatever she had to put up with with him.

But she still wasn’t ready to face her mother right now. Her mother had a way of knowing what she was feeling by just looking at her, and she didn’t want to risk it all coming out.

All of a sudden she realized that she had lost track of Mickey. She looked around. She recognized a couple of the mechanics she had known from when she had been dating Mickey. There were a couple of others she didn’t know, and then there was the one that had his head buried under the bonnet of a midnight blue car she recognized as a Vauxhall of some type. His dark jeans and heavy work boots looked vaguely familiar somehow, as did the shape of his back as he was bent over the engine, but there was really no way of knowing who he was unless she got a closer look.

Finally she spotted Mickey, deep in conversation with his old boss. She made her way across the room. Since she didn’t want to disturb them, she stopped before she actually joined them, but she still made sure she was within earshot.

“Please?” Mickey was begging. Neither of them seemed to notice her, which suited her just fine.

“I’m sorry,” Mr. Mudali said. “You were gone three months—”

“Three months?” Mickey asked in astonishment.

“And I couldn’t wait any longer. I hired someone else, a brilliant mechanic. He’s the reason that we’re so busy. People come all the way from Ealing to have him look at their cars. One even came from Reading. We’re doing so well I’m even thinking of expanding, having him take over here while I open a new shop across town.” Mudali paused thoughtfully. “We might be busy enough to take on another mechanic part time. I’ll let him decide. And you know he’s another Smith, in fact. Maybe you two are related.” Mudali laughed. “Hey, Manchester, come here! There’s someone I want you to meet.”

“Oi, I’m busy here!” the man shouted back. Even muffled by the rest of the sounds of the garage, as well as his head being halfway in the engine, it was obvious he had a strong Northern accent. 

“Who’s in charge, eh?” Mudali snapped. “You come when I tell you to come.”

With an irritated groan the man stood up and turned towards them. Rose’s breath caught and her heart skipped a beat. She walked up to join Mickey, who was gaping at the sight of the mechanic.

“It can’t be,” he said in a low voice. “‘S just someone who looks like him a bit, is all. You can’t really tell under all that hair.”

Rose didn’t answer, still staring in shock at a prominent nose and overly large ears, features that—despite being hidden behind slightly too long hair and an unshaven face—she knew as well as her own. Her heart began to beat again, pounding wildly, almost painfully, in her chest. 

“It can’t be him,” she whispered. “It can’t be. I saw him change myself.”

As the man crossed the room to join them, he stumbled over a large spanner that had been left in the middle of the floor. 

“Oi!” he shouted to the room at large. “Who’s the stupid ape who left this lying here?”

“Oh my God,” Rose murmured. “It’s him. It’s really him. It’s the Doctor.”

 


	3. Chapter Two—London, 7 July 2007

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Recognizable dialogue from the episode _Rose_.

**Chapter Two—London, 7 July 2007**

John crossed the garage, following the sound of his boss's voice and still mumbling about stupid apes and their carelessness in leaving things lying around.

He finally spotted Mudali near the office. He appeared to be with someone, a young man, but he barely noticed either of them when he saw a flash of blonde hair. The young woman it belonged to was rapidly retreating into the office.

Something about the hair triggered memories of his dreams.

_Blonde hair. A hand in his. "Run!"_

A tiny voice inside his head told him it was a coincidence, there were millions of people in Greater London alone, and the likelihood that any particular blonde girl was the person that had been haunting his dreams was infinitesimal. That was assuming that the girl from his dreams was even real. Which she probably wasn't. But he couldn't take that chance. Before he could stop himself, he rushed past them and into the office.

The room was filled to overflowing with people waiting for their cars to be finished. He glanced around. There was no one at the desk and the girl, whoever she was, didn't appear to be there. He rushed out through the glass door to the street.

She wasn't there.

The street was filled with people. Typical Saturday afternoon. It was possible she was there and he just didn't see her, he reminded himself. It wasn't as if she was particularly tall.

But the street was crowded with shops, pubs and cafés. A Chinese Kitchen was directly across the street. A pizza parlor was down just a bit from there. There was a Tesco Express. A hair and nail salon. A launderette two blocks in the other direction, with a newsagent next door and the ubiquitous golden arches of a McDonalds next to it. She could have gone in any one of those or a dozen other shops.

John scanned the crowd again and suddenly spotted long blonde hair. He rushed across the street, ignoring the cursing of a driver he had cut in front of.

"Wait! Wait!" he shouted. He caught up to her and grabbed her arm. She turned angrily.

It wasn't her. It was an Asian girl with bleached blonde hair.

The girl cursed him out in two languages—English and Mandarin and how did he know that—before continuing down the street.

"Sorry," he said as she walked away. He sighed. "Where'd she go?" he said to himself.

After another minute or two of looking, he made his way back to the garage. Once in the office, he heard a toilet flush. Mrs. Mudali exited the small loo attached to the waiting room and waddled back to the desk.

"Abhirati," he said. "Did you see a blonde girl come through here a couple of minutes ago?"

"I've seen lots of blonde girls today, John," she told him. "But not for the last few minutes. What's her name?"

"I don't know," he answered. "That's part of the reason I'm looking for her. She might have come in with someone. A young black man."

"Doesn't narrow it down much," she said. "Besides the blonde hair, what did she look like?"

"Uh… I don't know," he admitted. "I didn't get a good look at her."

She looked at him sympathetically. "Sorry, John," she said. "I can't help you. I've seen so many people today I can't keep track anymore."

Disappointed, he walked back into the garage and joined his boss and the young man he was with. He scanned the area just in case she had returned.

"Where did you go?" Mudali asked.

"Just thought I saw someone I recognized," John told him. "But I couldn't find her." He turned to the other man. He also looked vaguely familiar but not in the way the girl had. Probably had seen him around the Estate, he thought, and returned to looking around the garage.

"John, I want you to meet someone," Mudali said. "This is the man you replaced. He is also a Smith. Mickey Smith."

"Nice to meet you, Ricky," John said absently.

"It's Mickey," the young man corrected.

"Sure it is," John replied. "'S what I said, isn't it?"

"No, you said—"

"That girl you were with…" John said to Mickey. "The one who ran off. Who was she?"

Mickey glanced at the office. "Uh…"

"You were with a girl," he said. "Who was she?"

"I wasn't with anyone. I dunno who she was," Mickey said quickly. Too quickly.

John scowled at him. "Thanks a lot, _Ricky_. You've been a lot of help." He turned to his boss. "You saw her, Mudali. Who was she?"

"I don't know," Mudali answered. "Just that I've seen her around."

He glared at them both. "Well, I've got a lot to do. If that's all, I'm going back to the Vauxhall." He stalked off.

"Excellent mechanic," Mudali said. "But lousy with people."

~oOo~

Rose rushed out of the mechanic's shop and darted around the corner. When she heard him come out the door, she hid behind some bins.

"Where'd she go?" she heard him say. She crouched lower, hoping he didn't spot her. He didn't.

After she was sure he had gone back inside, she ran back to the TARDIS. She burst through the door and saw the Doctor standing at the console peering into the monitor. The blue-green glow of the Time Rotor reflected off his thick, dark rimmed glasses and illuminated his pale, freckled face. After seeing his former self in the shop, it was almost a shock to see him standing there like that, pinstripes, artfully messy hair and all, and she realized she had half expected to see him looking like he used to and wearing a beat up leather jacket and jeans.

"You're here!" she said breathlessly.

"Of course I'm here," he said without looking up. "I told you I would be."

"No," she said. "You're here. You're _already_ here."

He looked up at her, puzzled. "What?"

Mickey burst into the TARDIS. "You're here!" he said to the Doctor. Then he turned to Rose. "Where'd you go?"

"I couldn't let him see me," she told him. "I don't think he's met me yet. If he met me now, before he met me, he'd remember me later and it could cause a paradox or something."

The Doctor looked from Rose to Mickey and back again. "What?" he said again.

Both Rose and Mickey ignored him. "What about me? Him seeing me couldn't cause a paradox?" asked Mickey.

"No," she told him. "He wouldn't remember you. After all, he barely remembered you after he had met you. Even after the Nestene Consciousness had made a plastic copy of you, he barely remembered you existed."

Mickey whirled on the Doctor. "Is that true? You barely remembered me after you met me?"

"What?" the Doctor said again to Rose, ignoring Mickey. "What do you mean I'm here?"

"You're already here," Rose told him slowly as if she was talking to a small child.

"And you're working as a mechanic," Mickey added.

"What!"

"Okay, that's four 'what's'," Rose told him. "That's a lot, even from you."

The Doctor ignored that. "Okay, you're telling me that I'm already here… working at a mechanic's shop?"

"Yeah, mine!" Mickey said. "You took my job!"

"And it's not you," Rose told him. "It's… last you. I think before you met me."

The Doctor shook his head. "Not possible. I had just regenerated right before that. You were the first person I met, Rose. Had to be someone who just looked like me."

"That's what I thought at first," she said. "But he had your voice, same Northern accent and everything. And he called everyone in the garage 'stupid apes'."

"Does sound like me," the Doctor admitted.

"And he called me Ricky," Mickey added.

Rose snorted. "Really?"

"Don't laugh!" Mickey said. "But I'm not sure that it's before he met you. When you took off, first thing he did was take off after you. Then when he came back, he asked me about you. Wanted to know who the girl was that I was with."

"What did you say?"

"Nothin'," he told her. "Figured since you took off you didn't want him to see you, so I told him I wasn't with you. That's when he called me Ricky."

The Doctor's mouth twisted into a small grin as he tried not to laugh.

"'S not funny," Mickey protested. "I always hated it when you called me Ricky."

The Doctor cleared his throat and put a serious expression on his face. "Of course it isn't funny," he said. "But seriously, it's not me." He tapped his temple. "I'd know if it was me. Whenever I am close to another incarnation of myself, particularly if I meet myself, I get a bit of an echo."

Rose stared at him. "Does it happen often, you meeting yourself?"

"It's been known to happen," he said. "Once or twice. Or three times. Alright, four." He got a faraway look on his face. "Well, I say four…"

"Doctor!"

Rose's voice jerked him back to the present. "Anyway…" He stretched out the word to three times its normal pronunciation. "No echo, therefore not me. Not to mention that we were together basically that entire regeneration, Rose. Joined at the hip, you could say. I certainly wasn't here working as a mechanic during part of it."

Rose frowned. "Hang on," she said. "You said I was the first person you met after you regenerated?"

"Yeah."

"And we were together the whole time after that."

"Yeah…"

"But that can't be right. After I first met you, but before we were travelling, I was looking for you on the computer. I found this person, Clarence or Clifton or something… You remember, Mickey. You went with when I went to see him because you thought he was an axe murder."

"Clive," Mickey said.

"Yeah, that's right," Rose said. "Clive. Anyway, Clive had been researching you, had all these pictures of you, from the Titanic, from the Kennedy assassination, even from Krakatoa. And I wasn't in them. We didn't go those places. I just figured you had done those things before you met me."

Frowning, the Doctor shook his head. "I don't remember that. I don't remember doing any of that. Are you sure it was me in the pictures?" She gave him a look. "Yes, of course you are." He raked a hand through his hair, causing it to stand straight up, as he sank down on the jump seat. "Why don't I remember?" he said to himself. "First thing I did after I regenerated was I caught the tail end of a signal by the Nestene Consciousness and followed it down to Earth. I ended up at Henrik's…" he sighed, "found the electrician's body and then saved this person who had somehow managed to get cornered by a bunch of shop dummies." He grinned at her. "And the rest is history. We've been together ever since. Except…"

"Except?" Rose asked.

"No, I came straight back," he said to himself. "Yes, of course I did. Didn't I?"

"When? When did you come straight back?"

"After I left. After you turned me down the first time I asked. But…" His voice trailed off. "Is it possible I didn't come back straight away? No," he immediately answered himself. "But just in case…" He moved back to the console, typed in some commands and studied the results. He shook his head. "I'm the only Time Lord on this planet."

"Are you sure?" Mickey asked. "I mean there's a lot of people on this planet…"

The Doctor raised an eyebrow at him. "And only one Time Lord. Me. I just did a scan for Time Lords. According to this, there are no other Time Lords on the planet. And since there are no other Time Lords, if the TARDIS had found one, which it didn't, it would be me.

"Not to mention that if I was here, the TARDIS would be, too, and there's no evidence that there's another TARDIS here. Although…" He rubbed the back of his neck thoughtfully. "If there was, it would explain a thing or two. Like why the TARDIS is insisting that there's a crisis here." He frowned and turned back to the monitor. "I've spent the past two hours running diagnostics on the TARDIS, but it didn't occur to me to look to see if there was another TARDIS in the area. After all, why should it? There aren't any other TARDISes."

The Doctor made some more minute adjustments to the controls. When he looked at the monitor again, his face became serious. He looked up at their expectant faces.

"What is it?" Rose asked.

"There is a very, very faint echo on the TARDIS data screen. As if there's another TARDIS powered down somewhere near here. I can't get an exact lock on her—only that she's somewhere in the London area, and fairly close by from the looks of this. But why would another TARDIS be here if I'm not?"

"If his TARDIS is here, then that could mean the person we saw is you."

He looked up at her. "Rose, there are no other Time Lords here," he said firmly. "No one other than me."

"But if he's you…"

He shook his head. "No. The only reading I'm getting is for me. _This_ me." He turned back to the view screen. "We need to find the other TARDIS, find out what's wrong with her, why she's powered down. Then maybe we can figure out what happened to me."

He strode out the TARDIS door. When he realized that Rose and Mickey hadn't followed, he stuck his head back inside. "Coming?"

~oOo~

"I don't get it," Mickey said in a low voice to Rose. They had been trailing behind the Doctor for ten minutes as he seemed to be wandering aimlessly through the Powell Estate holding his sonic screwdriver in front of him. Its tip was lit up in blue, and it was making a whirring sound as he waved it back and forth. "How's this gonna help him find the TARDIS?"

"He's scanning for alien tech," she answered.

"Actually I'm scanning for non-alien tech," the Doctor corrected. "My sonic screwdriver is Time Lord technology, as is my TARDIS of course, so the TARDIS isn't alien tech to my screwdriver. If I was scanning for alien tech, the sonic would be going off like a Guy Fawkes Night firework."

"Because human technology is alien to it?" Mickey asked.

"Nah," the Doctor responded. "I can filter that out. But do you have any idea how many things humans use that are based on alien technology? There's tablet computers and IPods and the microchips you put in pets…" He stopped short and his voice trailed off as he examined the readings on his screwdriver. Then he headed off again. "This way!"

He led them down a quiet street and around a corner to a main thoroughfare. After walking several blocks he turned again so they were headed back the way they had come. Finally after several minutes he stopped at a narrow alleyway. He turned and grinned at them. "Here we are," he said. "She's right down here."

"You're kidding," Rose said. "We've been walking twenty minutes and we're only around the corner from where we started!"

The Doctor looked around in surprise. "You're right. That's odd. Why didn't we end up directly here?"

"Who cares?" Mickey said. "Let's just get this over with." As he stomped down the alley, the Doctor and Rose exchanged glances. "You comin' or what?" he hollered crossly. Rose shrugged and they followed him.

The TARDIS was sitting at the blind end of the alley, surrounded on two sides by buildings and the third by ten foot chain link fencing. "Well, that's why we didn't come directly," the Doctor said, walking up to it. "No way to get here except the way we came." He pulled his key out of his pocket and put it in the lock. "That's weird."

"What's weird?" Rose asked.

"Door won't unlock," he said. He jiggled the key in the lock. "It won't turn. Rose, give me your key."

Rose pulled the long chain that held her TARDIS key out from under her top and over her head. She handed it to the Doctor, and he tried it in the lock. "Huh, yours isn't working either," he said as he handed it back to her. He tried his own key again. This time he received a shock. "Ow!" He shoved his injured finger in his mouth for a moment. "Hmm. The only time I've ever been locked out like this is…"

"Is when?" Rose asked.

He looked at her gravely. "When she's been damaged. She'll lock me out while she rebuilds herself."

"How long can that take?" Mickey asked.

The sound of his voice startled them, and they both jumped. Mickey shook his head in disgust. "You forgot I was here, the both of you."

"No, of course not," the Doctor said smoothly. "We knew you were there… sort of. Anyway, to answer your question, it really depends on how much damage has been done and what kind. Hours, days, weeks... months…"

Rose's eyes widened. "Months?"

"Yes," the Doctor admitted reluctantly. "But still, not my TARDIS! Well, it is my TARDIS, but from the past, or the future I suppose. But not my current one! That one is right where we left it. The real question is, is this a past TARDIS, or a future one?"

"And why is it here?" Rose asked.

"And if the TARDIS is here, where am I?"

"I'll tell you where you are," Mickey said. "Down at the shop, working as a mechanic."

The Doctor sighed the long suffering sigh of the put upon. "I told you. That isn't me. I scanned for non-human life forms, and there wasn't a trace of another Time Lord."

"I know what I saw," Mickey told him. "And more important, I know who I saw."

~oOo~

Later, back in their TARDIS's console room, the Doctor was fiddling with the controls while Rose and Mickey watched.

"Now if that was a future TARDIS, this won't work. But if that TARDIS is a part of my past, I should be able to access its recording of what happened using my TARDIS's memory banks. The TARDIS keeps a record of everything that ever happens in the control room, a bit like CCTV, but not CCTV," he said. He spun a dial, and the built-in monitor lit up. "Ha!" he cried. "Now we're getting somewhere!"

"But doesn't that mean that that TARDIS is from your past?" Rose asked.

"Not necessarily," he said. "Now the two of you think that that was me you saw, correct?"

"Yes," Rose and Mickey said in unison.

"So I'm going to go with that assumption and prove to you that you're wrong and that there just wasn't any time that I could possibly have been here in that regeneration." He made an adjustment and on the monitor appeared a fiery object that was in the general shape of a man.

Rose gasped, a quick involuntary intake of air at the sight. "That's you regenerating into the you I met, isn't it?" she asked quietly.

"Yeah," the Doctor said. As he spoke, on the screen the fire coalesced into the Doctor Rose and Mickey had first met.

The Doctor on the screen sank to the floor and dropped his head into his hands. His body shook. Mickey stared at the screen in astonishment to see the man who had always seemed so strong be so broken. Rose bit her lip as tears sprang to her eyes.

The Doctor swallowed hard. "Well, I don't think we need to see that," he said. "Fast forward." He made an adjustment to the controls and the images began to whiz past, too fast for Rose and Mickey to make out. He slowed them down. Now on the screen was the leather and jumper wearing Doctor putting together something that was about the size of his hand as a warning light blinked on the control panel.

"That's the thing you used to blow up my job with!" Rose said.

"Yep!" he replied. "Just before I met you. And you were the first person I met. This proves that." On the screen, the Doctor left the TARDIS and it sat empty. "Fast forward again."

They all watched as the Doctor returned, left, returned, and left again. In between times, they could see him move the TARDIS.

"If you took off in the TARDIS," Mickey said, "what's to say you didn't go back in time or something?"

"Do you really think I'd take off in the middle of fighting the Nestene Consciousness to pop back to have tea on the Titanic?" the Doctor said incredulously. "Might do afterwards… but not during!"

The younger Doctor returned to the console room. He was carrying something that he attached to the console. From the image on the screen it wasn't clear what it was.

"What's he doin'?" Mickey asked.

"Is that when…" Rose began. On the screen, a younger Rose ran in through the TARDIS door, stopped and stared around her, and then ran out again. When she came back in, the Doctor was standing by the console. It was obvious they were talking to each other, and Rose noticed something she hadn't noticed up until that point.

"Where's the sound?" she asked.

"Oh, right," the Doctor said. He made some adjustments.

" _It's alien_ ," the onscreen Rose said.

" _Yep_."

" _Are you alien_?"

" _Yes_ ," he answered. " _Is that alright_?"

" _Yeah_ ," she said immediately.

" _It's called the TARDIS, this thing_ ," he told her. " _T-A-R-D-I-S, that's Time And Relative Dimension In Space._ "

The onscreen Rose made a small sound like she was trying not to cry.

" _That's okay_ ," the onscreen Doctor said. " _Culture shock. Happens to the best of us._ "

" _Did they kill him_?" she asked. " _Mickey? Did they kill Mickey? Is he dead?_ "

" _Oh... didn't think of that_."

The Doctor quickly fast forwarded while Mickey stared at him.

"Unbelievable," he said. "Rose was right. You completely forgot about me."

The Doctor didn't answer.

Onscreen, they saw the younger Doctor fly Mickey and Rose back to the Estate. Rose and Mickey left the TARDIS while the Doctor stood in the doorway. Again they couldn't hear the conversation. The Doctor turned and walked back into the TARDIS, shutting the door behind him. He crossed to the controls and sent the TARDIS into the Vortex. He landed again and walked to the door.

"Okay, here is where I asked you to come with again, Rose," the Doctor said. "We'll see me stand at the doorway and ask you, and then we'll see you come inside again."

But instead, onscreen the Doctor walked out the door and shut it behind him. For several long moments nothing happened.

The Doctor stared at the screen, brow furrowed. "I don't understand. It didn't happen like that. I went back for you and you came with." He fast forwarded until the point where his younger self walked back into the TARDIS. The Doctor checked the display. "I don't get it. According to this, I was gone over four hours."

As they continued to watch the screen, the younger Doctor flew the TARDIS somewhere else and left again. The Doctor fast forwarded. This time his younger self was gone for over a day before returning.

"Why don't I remember this?" the Doctor said under his breath.

Over and over again the Doctor fast forwarded through the TARDIS's monitoring of the console room. The younger Doctor would land somewhere and leave, sometimes for hours, sometimes for days, before returning.

And then the footage stopped and was replaced by static.

"What happened?" Mickey asked.

"I don't know," the Doctor replied. "Some sort of interference. But that shouldn't happen inside the TARDIS."

He turned a dial and for a moment the image cleared somewhat. The younger Doctor was rushing around the central controls. The Doctor turned the sound back on.

"No, no, no, no, no!" they could hear the other Doctor shout through the static. He began trying to fix something on the console with his sonic screwdriver.

The image disappeared again for a moment, only to be replaced by a view of the Doctor huddled over. He cried out. More static, and then they could see the younger Doctor unconscious on the floor. Something dropped from the ceiling. The Doctor froze the image.

"What is that?" the Doctor said, squinting at the monitor. "I can't make it out." He took a deep breath and let it out in a huff of frustration. "One thing more I can try." He typed in a command.

A holographic image of the younger Doctor appeared on the other side of the room. He was lying on the floor, clearly unconscious. As the image flickered, something that looked like a helmet descended from the ceiling and fitted itself neatly onto the younger Doctor's head. There was a flash of light and the hologram vanished for a moment. When it returned, the trio could see the TARDIS door open. A portion of the grating that made up the floor lifted up, causing the Doctor to roll out the door. The door shut again and the image abruptly shut off. Rose and Mickey turned and stared at the Doctor they were with. His jaw had dropped in shock.

"Blimey," the Doctor said under his breath.


	4. Chapter Three—London, 7 July 2007

**Chapter Three—London, 7 July 2007**

_A holographic image of the younger Doctor appeared. He was lying on the floor, clearly unconscious. As the image flickered, something that looked like a helmet descended from the ceiling and fitted itself neatly onto the younger Doctor's head. There was a flash of light and the hologram vanished for a moment. When it returned, the trio could see the TARDIS door open. A portion of the grating that made up the floor lifted up, causing the Doctor to roll out the door. The door shut again and the image abruptly shut off. Rose and Mickey turned and stared at the Doctor they were with. His jaw had dropped in shock._

_"Blimey," the Doctor said under his breath._

"What… what just happened?" Rose asked. "What was that thing?"

"Something I never thought I'd ever have to use," the Doctor said. "And as for what just happened, I'm not entirely sure. But I think I need to see the man who looks like the old me." He ran a hand through his hair, causing it to stand up. "The question is, how? How to get a good look at him without him seeing me?"

"But if it is him, you, it'll be before you've regenerated, yeah? So he won't know who you are," Rose said.

"I can't count on that," the Doctor told her. "I told you that there's an echo when I meet myself."

"But if that's the case, with you here, shouldn't he be feeling the echo now?" she asked.

"Assuming the person you saw is me," the Doctor said, "we both should be. But it's possible that I'm not feeling one because we're not close enough together." He frowned. "Under normal circumstances, and admittedly these are not normal circumstances, if we met face to face he'd be able to tell I'm a Time Lord, and since there aren't any other Time Lords, and since he wouldn't recognize me, he'd know I was a future version of him…"

"But you said you've met yourself before," Rose said.

"Yeah, I have. But in this case I'm interfering in my own timeline. This has to be handled delicately. If it's not handled carefully enough, the results could be catastrophic. And not just to me... Well, let's just say I don't want to risk it." His brow furrowed thoughtfully. "Mickey said whoever that was may have recognized you, but he didn't know who you were. That would mean he's met you before. If he's me and I've already met you, why wouldn't I know who you were?" He sighed loudly in frustration. "And why don't I remember any of this?"

"I dunno," she said, "but I do have an idea about seeing him. There's a couple of restaurants right across the street from the garage. Maybe we can wait in one of them until the shop closes and he leaves. We should get a good view of him without him seein' us."

"What time is it?" Mickey asked.

"A little after five, local time," the Doctor answered.

Mickey shook his head. "It's Saturday. The shop's probably closed by now." He pulled his mobile out of his pocket. After a brief conversation, he rang off and turned back to them. "He's already gone for the day. Did find out his full name though." He looked at the Doctor evenly. "John Smith. Isn't that the name you used when you were teachin' at Deffrey Vale?"

The Doctor and Rose exchanged glances, with Rose's clearly saying _I told you so_.

"We need more information about him," the Doctor said. "How long he's been here. Where he lives. Where he was before he got here."

"So you're no longer denyin' he's you?" Mickey asked.

The Doctor yanked on one ear and grimaced. "With the evidence we have so far, let's just say it's… possible he's me. But the jury's still out." Mickey rolled his eyes. "The question is," the Doctor continued, "if we can't talk to him directly, don't even know where he is, how are we going to get the answers we need?"

Rose and Mickey exchanged glances and smirked. "Well, there's one person on the Estate that not only knows everybody but everybody's business too," Mickey said.

The Doctor glanced from one to the other of them. "Who?" he asked. And then it hit him. He got a pained expression on his face. "Oh, no."

~oOo~

John unlocked the door to his flat and carried his dinner straight back into the small space that was his lounge. Not one for cooking, John had picked up a sandwich and crisps from the deli down the street and some beer from Tesco Express on his way home. It was either takeaway or beans on toast, and even the idea of beans on toast made him shudder in disgust.

He set the food down on the beat-up old coffee table and sat down on the threadbare sofa. Not only was the sofa worn, but it was ugly. It was covered in a rough, plaid fabric in orange, yellow and black that hadn't been popular since the '70s. The flat had come furnished, which suited him since he hadn't owned anything except a change of clothes when he had arrived back on the estate, but everything in the place was in bad shape and hadn't been particularly nice when new. The only exceptions were a very expensive new mattress and a state of the art computer system that he had purchased himself. To the outside world they would have seemed like luxuries, particularly in light of his meager salary, but he considered them necessities. The computer system was vital for his continuing search for clues to who he was. And the need for a decent mattress was self-evident. The old one was badly stained and emitted an odor whose source didn't bear thinking about, plus it had a spring that caught him in the back no matter how he lay down on it.

He flipped on the ancient television before cracking open a beer and unwrapping his sandwich. There was nothing of interest on, nothing that interested him at any rate. He wasn't into sports, the news wasn't new but a rehash of what had happened the previous week, game shows were too easy and thus boring, and dramas? Too domestic. He watched a few minutes of an American science fiction program until he decided the science behind it was so ridiculous that it made the show unwatchable.

Finally he found a channel broadcasting a film he hadn't seen, a recent James Bond film starring an actor he didn't know. He took a swig of his beer and sat back, willing to suspend disbelief for a few minutes. But his mind wandered back to the shop and the girl he had seen. He had seen more than blonde hair. He had caught a glimpse of her face before she had left. He sat back and closed his eyes, trying to recapture the image.

_Blonde hair. A wide mouth..._

He was startled from his reverie by something jumping onto the sofa next to him. He opened his eyes again. A black cat was sitting next to him, calmly helping itself to his sandwich.

It was not his cat. He did not own a cat. He raised an eyebrow.

"Where did you come from?" he said, figuring it had wandered in from the Estate through the cat flap built into the exterior door. He vaguely recalled someone telling him that the strays would do that but he couldn't remember who, or when he had had that conversation.

The cat did not deign to answer, not with a meow or even a glance in his direction. Instead it continued to focus on trying to eat his dinner.

"Oi, that's mine," he protested. He ripped off a chunk of the sandwich—the portion that had been chewed on by the cat—and put it on the floor. The cat jumped down, pulled the meat and cheese out from between the bread slices, and began to nibble on it.

"You must be thirsty," he said. Shoving the rest of the sandwich in his mouth, he got up and went into the kitchen for a bowl of water. On the way back he retrieved his sketchpad and pencils from the bedroom.

"Now you can stay for a bit," he told the cat as it—no, she—began to drink. "But you can't move in. Don't know how long I'm stayin' here."

The cat ignored him and returned to eating the cheese. John watched for a minute and then turned to the sketchpad. He flipped through the pages, glancing at his drawings. Monsters, metal men, pepper pots fitted with eye stalks, plungers and whisks—a psychiatrist would have a field day with him. He flipped quickly through those pages, as he did the pictures of planets on fire. Perhaps not typical dream images, but all they were were dream images. They could have nothing to do with his previous life.

He turned the page and saw the sketch of the girl he had been working on that morning. Now he could see what was wrong with it. Her nose was slightly shorter and wider than he had drawn. And her ears… They were smaller, but there was more. Something missing.

Earrings. Big gold-colored hoops.

He made the corrections, just barely adjusting a line here, a shadow there, and then added the earrings. When he was finished, he sat back and stared at the picture.

It was her. The girl he had been dreaming about. But more than that, it was the girl he had seen in the shop. The girl's hair had been shorter, her makeup different, but it was her, he was sure of it.

The cat jumped back up on the sofa and rubbed against him, purring. He absently stroked her head as he puzzled over the drawing.

"Who are you?" he said. "And how can I find you again?"

~oOo~

"Now remember," Rose said, "don't tell Mum we've been here all day."

Both the Doctor and Mickey rolled their eyes. They were carrying a couple of pizzas: part dinner, part peace offering just in case she had heard they were back and hadn't stopped by the flat first.

"As if," Mickey said.

Rose unlocked the door. As they walked in the door, she was struck as always by how tiny the flat was. Despite having recently been repaired from damage it had received at Christmastime and received a fresh coat of paint, the narrow hall looked cramped and dark. Perhaps the flat seemed small because she was comparing it to the grandeur of the TARDIS, she supposed. Or perhaps she had just outgrown it, as she had outgrown estate life while traveling with the Doctor.

Deciding not to dwell on that thought, she called out to her mum.

"Mum, we're home. Are you here?"

Before the words were out of her mouth, Jackie ran out of the lounge and met them in the hall. "Rose!" she exclaimed and pulled her daughter in for a hug. "Why don't you ever call? Why bother even having a mobile when you don't use it?"

Rose knew that her mother really didn't expect an answer. "We brought dinner," she said when her mother let her go.

"Thank goodness," her mother said. "I've got nothing in. Certainly not enough for those two." Jackie cast a disparaging glance towards the lounge. The two women followed them in to find that in the short time she had been hugging Rose, the Doctor and Mickey had gone into the lounge, settled themselves on the white imitation-leather chairs, and begun to eat. Mickey had a slice of pizza in one hand and was using the remote to flip through the channels on the telly with the other.

"Don't get too comfortable," Jackie told them all. "Stuart is comin' over."

"Stuart? Who's Stuart?" Rose asked. "Whatever happened to Dennis?"

"And as far as that's concerned, whatever happened to Howard?" the Doctor added.

"Howard was ages ago, and as for Dennis…" Jackie made a rude noise. "Stuart works over at the Chinese takeaway," she told them.

Rose frowned thoughtfully. "Stuart, Stuart… Oh, I remember! Isn't he the cook over there?"

"Yeah," Jackie said.

"Oh! Is he the one who does the wonderful chips?" the Doctor asked.

"That's him," Jackie said. "Does a gorgeous curry as well."

"You know, you should tell him to put the chips in newspaper," the Doctor told her. "Nothing like chips served the traditional way in newspaper. They taste better than when they're wrapped in foil. The newspaper doesn't trap the moisture like foil does, and it absorbs some of the oil, leaving them crisp instead of soggy."

Rose rolled her eyes. "I think you just like the flavor of newspaper ink," she said.

"Depends on the ink used, Rose," he said. "Some are quite bitter."

"Trust you to know," she muttered.

Jackie retrieved some plates and napkins from the kitchen. She pointedly handed a plate and napkin each to the Doctor and Mickey, warning them not to make a mess. Mickey took both without turning from the television. There was another match on.

After the two women helped themselves to slices of pizza and sat down on the sofa, the Doctor turned to them.

"So, Jackie," he said between bites of extra cheese and pepperoni. "What's new around here?"

Rose's eyes got huge. _What are you doing_ , she mouthed. She knew from long years of experience that asking her mother a leading question like that could set them up for a several hour gossip session despite her mum's new boyfriend coming over.

The Doctor ignored her and grinned at Jackie.

"Well," Jackie said conspiratorially. "Rose, your cousin Lavina is pregnant again. This will be her fourth. Mo got a new job, not sure doin' what though. Bev's sister's daughter got another tattoo. This one winds half up her arm. Looks like a snake." She shuddered. "And someone new just moved in across the way. A real grouch. But that's not all bad. He managed to get Rita and Chuck quiet for once. I thought the row they were having this morning would last into next week…"

As Jackie continued to talk, Rose watched the Doctor take another bite. The cheese stretched, forming a long string between the slice of pizza and his mouth. He wrapped it around his tongue three times before biting it off and pulling it into his mouth. She stared at him, disturbed by how disgusted she was yet at the same time how oddly arousing she found it. As if he knew what she was thinking, he smirked at her and gave her a wink.

"Git," she said under her breath.

An hour later, Rose shifted uncomfortably in her seat. Mickey had switched to watching a movie at some point and was still staring at the screen. And her mother was still talking. The Doctor was pretending to be engrossed in the dramas taking place on the estate, periodically making sympathetic noises. She didn't know how he could do it. Listening to her mum go on and on like that made her eyes cross.

"And Brian's son what's-his-name is marrying that girl he's been living with the past couple of years," Jackie said.

At that, Rose's ears perked up. "Susie? Rob's marrying Susie?"

"Yeah," her mother answered. "Wasn't she one of the ones that you used to hang out with?"

"Yeah, she was." Mickey answered for Rose without turning from the telly. "It was Rose, Susie, Shareen, Keisha, and Rita. They'd all go out clubbin', then come home absolutely pissed. Sometimes Rose'd stay out all night with 'em and say she'd stayed with Shareen or Keisha and they'd say they had stayed here."

As Jackie raised an eyebrow at her daughter, Rose glared at him. "And thank you so much for sharing that with my mother, Mick. Just wait until I tell Mum and the Doctor about the time you…"

At this, Mickey finally turned from the television. "No!" he said quickly. "Don't need to go into all that."

The Doctor leaned back against the back of the sofa. His eyebrow arched and a small, amused smile played around his lips.

"Anyway, if the two of you were friends, you'd probably be invited to the wedding, Rose. That is, if you were here," Jackie said pointedly.

"We might be able to come back for it," the Doctor said, and Rose looked at him in surprise. Shock was more like. _Are you sure_ , she mouthed. He shrugged indifferently.

"Uh, yeah," she said, turning back to her mother. "We might be able to come back."

"Good," Jackie said vehemently. "People are always askin' about you, what you're doin', when you're comin' back, that sort of thing. I never know what to tell them."

"Tell them I'm traveling," Rose said.

"Traveling? People will only buy traveling for so long, and then they begin to wonder if you're in jail," Jackie replied.

"Or dead," Mickey said with a sharp glance at Jackie. He had never completely gotten over the fact that for a year people had thought he had murdered Rose when she had begun traveling with the Doctor. Rose's mother, who had been behind the rumor of Mickey murdering Rose, didn't have the grace to look shamefaced. She had apologized, and in her mind that was the end of it.

"So, Jackie, Rose and Mickey went past the auto repair shop today…" the Doctor said, changing the subject. He didn't need to say more. It was enough to get Jackie started again.

"Oh, yeah, they've fixed it all up," she said. "They've got a new mechanic, too. He's the one who ended the row between Rita and Chuck." They all looked at her blankly. "I told you, but as usual none of you were listening. He just moved in across the way a few months ago. Works at the shop and does odd jobs around the estate. Had him in here myself to fix my tap since no one here was around to do it."

"He was here?" Rose asked incredulously. "In the flat? And you didn't mention it?"

"Why would I?" Jackie asked. "'S just the tap."

"Did he look like anyone you know?" Rose asked. "Seem familiar in any way?"

"Not really," she said. She thought for a moment. "Maybe a bit like that American bloke from the Tour de France. Lance something or other."

"Lance Armstrong?" the Doctor asked incredulously.

Jackie nodded. "Yeah, that's the one," she answered. "Not much, mind, but a bit."

"Why would Lance Armstrong be livin' on the Estate?" Mickey asked.

"Didn't say he was, did I?" Jackie said.

"Did he remind you of anyone else?" Rose asked.

"Well, he did look a little like first him," she said. "Just a little bit, though. He's got much longer hair and a scruffy beard half the time, and no leather jacket. Course it is July…"

"And you didn't think to call me?"

"Why would I?" Jackie asked again. "'S not him, after all. He changed. Doesn't look like that anymore. 'S not like he can change back." She paused as if a thought just occurred to her. "You can't change back, can you?"

"No, he can't," Rose answered.

"I don't know why you think I should have called. You know it's not him, Rose. He's sittin' right there next to you."

"Yes, of course I am," the Doctor said smoothly. "And where else would I be?"

Jackie frowned. "Why all the questions?" she asked suspiciously. "'S not like any of you to care one way or the other what happens around here."

They were saved from answering by a knock at the door. Jackie got up. "That'll be Stuart," she said. "I'd invite you to stay…" Her tone indicated that that was the last thing she wanted them to do.

"Nah, we'll be on our way," the Doctor said as they stood. Mickey picked up the pizza boxes. "Things to do, places to go and all that."

They met Stuart on the way out. He was a short Asian man who appeared to be in his mid-forties and smelled vaguely of Chinese takeaway and chips.

"Have you ever considered serving your chips in newspaper, Stuart?" the Doctor asked after they had been introduced. "It really brings out the flavor."

Stuart looked puzzled at the question. "Newspaper?" he asked.

Rose poked the Doctor in the side. When he turned to her she glared at him. "Ignore him," she said to Stuart. "That's what the rest of us do." She turned to give her mother a hug. "We'll be back soon, yeah?"

"Just don't let it be three months this time," Jackie replied.

"Oh, it won't," the Doctor said. "Probably will be tomorrow."

Jackie rolled her eyes. "I'll believe _that_ when I see it."

"Tomorrow?" Rose asked as the door shut behind them.

"I doubt the TARDIS will let us take off yet," the Doctor told her. "Probably won't until we know more about what's going on." He looked across the courtyard. "Hmm. Should have asked Jackie which flat he's in." He glanced back at the door and then grimaced. "Nope. Not going back in there."

"I could ask around, see if anyone else knows what flat he's in," Mickey suggested.

The Doctor scratched the back of his head thoughtfully. "No, I don't want him to find out people have been asking questions about him. Tomorrow is soon enough. With both TARDISes out of commission, it's not like either of us is going anywhere." His voice dwindled off, and he frowned. "I'm still not entirely sure what happened or why. I need to try and get more information from the TARDIS—see if I can clear up some of the interference. Only then can we figure out how to fix all this."

As the Doctor and Mickey began to make their way to the stairwell, Rose hung back, staring at the windows of the building across the courtyard. Lights were just beginning to come on in the windows, and she wondered which one was his.

He was over there somewhere. Her first Doctor. Her heart ached at the thought. Even though the Doctor was still with her, sometimes she missed his old self: beat up leather jacket, big ears and all. She wished she could see him again, just spend time with him, kind of like she had wanted to see her father again, but not. The feelings she had had for her Doctor were nothing like what she had had for her dad.

But look how seeing her father had turned out, with the Earth almost being sterilized by reapers. She couldn't risk the paradox.

But what she wouldn't give to see her first Doctor again.

"Rose, Rose!" The Doctor's voice pulled her out of her thoughts. She turned to him. "We're headed back to the TARDIS. Are you coming, or are you staying here?"

"I'm coming," she said.

He nodded. As he headed down the stairs, she began to follow, but not without a backward glance at the other building again.


	5. Chapter Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Minor reference to _The Feast of the Drowned_ by Stephen Cole.

**Chapter Four**

On their way back to the TARDIS, Mickey decided not to go with them.

"We've been gone three months," he said. "I've got to check to see if my flat is still mine and find out where my stuff is."

"Do you want me to go with?" Rose asked.

"Nah," he said. "I figure I'd go back to the pub for a bit afterwards. Unless you wanna come with?"

She rolled her eyes. "Oh, yeah, I'd love to sit around and watch you watch more telly," she said sarcastically.

Once back at the TARDIS, the Doctor immediately began to work on the console, trying to get more information from the TARDIS's memory banks. For a while Rose sat on the jump seat, hands under her thighs, feet swinging back and forth, as she watched him work. Normally when he worked on the TARDIS he'd keep up a running commentary, explaining to her what he was doing and why, and even if she didn't understand a word he was saying she'd feel like she was a part of everything. But this time he was completely silent. She knew it was just an indication of how serious he felt the situation was, but she still felt oddly excluded in a way she hadn't ever felt with him before they had met Reinette.

After a few more minutes of staring at him staring at the monitor, she got restless and got up to get something to read. Months earlier, before he had changed even, the Doctor had given her her own storage space in the console room. It was a small compartment under one of the floor gratings where she could keep some of her own stuff so she wouldn't have to run back to her own room every time she wanted something. At the time it had felt almost as momentous as when he had given her a key to the TARDIS. The Doctor had blushed, actually properly blushed, when Jack had compared it to him emptying out a drawer in his bedroom for her.

Rose got out a paperback novel and returned to the jump seat, but she wasn't able to concentrate on it. Instead her mind kept returning to the tiny glimpse she had had of her first Doctor. She reread the same page three times, not remembering a single word of it, as his face swam in front of her eyes.

She threw the book down on the seat next to her.

"Stop it," she muttered to herself.

The Doctor looked up. "What did you say, Rose?"

"Nothing," she said. "Sorry."

He nodded and returned to what he was doing.

Well, there wasn't anything she could do here, she thought. Anything she did would just distract him, and she clearly needed a distraction as well. She considered going out to try and find Mickey, but she knew from experience that sitting around the pub would be as boring as sitting around the console room.

Lord, what had she done on Saturday nights on the Estate before she had run off with the Doctor?

Clubbing, she reminded herself. Mickey had been right. She had spent a lot of time clubbing with Keisha, Shareen, Susie and Rita. She briefly considered ringing one of them, maybe even getting together, but she quickly rejected the idea. She knew Susie and Rita had blokes and would want to be with them on a Saturday night. She wasn't sure whether Keisha and Shareen had boyfriends, but if they didn't, and if they were anything like they used to be, they'd probably want to go pub crawling or something. She didn't want to go with them to try and pick someone up at a club, that wasn't her anymore.

But even if they didn't want to go out, what would she talk to them about anyway?

_What have you been up to the last couple of years, Rose?_

_Oh, I ran away with an alien from outer space. He has a time machine, and we've not only traveled millions of years in the future, but into the past as well. I've met a bodiless head in a jar, cat nun nurses, a woman who had had so much plastic surgery she had turned herself into a bitchy trampoline, and a werewolf from outer space. I've even met the Prime Minister and Queen Victoria._

No. The last time she had tried to talk to Keisha about what she had been up to she'd had to lie through her teeth about the Doctor, something Keisha hadn't noticed at the time because she was distracted by her own problems. She couldn't count on that this time.

She wandered the corridors for a bit, taking peeks into rooms she had never been in before—and why did the TARDIS have an entire room devoted to shoelaces, anyway? Finally, she watched a movie in the media room and went to bed.

Once there, though, she tossed and turned as her mind raced. Ever since Christmas in Cardiff in 1869, she had known that with a time machine the Doctor could take her into the past, where people long dead were alive again. But even after meeting Charles Dickens, Reinette, even her own father and herself as a baby, it had never occurred to her that she could ever see a past version of the Doctor himself.

As she fell asleep, her mind returned to the tiny glimpse she had had of him in the garage.

And longed for another one.

~oOo~

The Doctor huffed in irritation as he yet again watched the images on the small screen built into the TARDIS console. Nothing he did was clearing up the static in the display.

"Rose, this looks less like interference in the CCTV and more like actual damage to the TARDIS memory core. I can't figure it out. Any ideas?"

When Rose didn't answer, he looked up from the monitor. She wasn't there. He scanned his Time Sense only to realize to his surprise that it had been more than four hours since they had gotten back to the TARDIS. She must have gone to bed, he told himself.

Disappointed by her absence, he frowned and turned back to the screen.

~oOo~

_"Exterminate! Exterminate!"_

_Beams of deadly light lit up the night. He could hear the sounds of explosions, of feet running, of desperate parents calling for their lost children._

_"Exterminate! Exterminate!"_

_Giant pepper pots swooped out of the sky and floated above the ground, shooting everything in sight._

_"Exterminate! Exterminate!"_

_Children screamed in fright and pain._

_Fire. Fire everywhere. Burning everything in its path._

_"No more," he muttered, his voice low and cold._

_"Exterminate! Exterminate!"_

_"No more," he growled angrily._

_"Exterminate! Exterminate!"_

_"NO MORE!" His voice rang out over the din. "NO MORE! NO MORE!"_

Heart pounding and chest heaving, John shot up, fully awake in an instant. This nightmare had been the worst yet. He reached over for his sketchbook, and stopped. His hands were shaking. Besides, there was nothing about this nightmare he wanted to remember.

In an effort to calm himself he closed his eyes and took in several deep lungfuls of air, blowing them out slowly. Gradually his heart rate slowed.

The images made no sense to him. They had, could have, no basis in reality. But dream images often were symbolic of something else, he reminded himself. The dreamscape seemed clearly to be symbolic of a battle of some type.

All of a sudden it occurred to him that perhaps he could have been a soldier.

He could have kicked himself. How could he have been so stupid? Why hadn't he thought of that before? The vast majority of the dreams he had were of war, albeit in a futuristic setting. Perhaps he was suffering from amnesia brought on by some form of post-traumatic stress disorder.

Knowing he wouldn't get any more sleep, he got out of bed and sat down in front of his computer. His fingers flew across the keyboard. In his effort to try to find out who he was, over the last several months he'd hacked into a half-dozen computer databases and created false accounts so he could easily enter any time he wanted. The first time he had broken into one of the websites, he had wondered where, how and why he had learned how to do it, but now he just accepted the fact that he could and was grateful for the skill set.

This time he broke into the websites of the armed forces rather than that of Scotland Yard or the NHS. It took no more effort for him than hacking into the others had. But several hours later he knew no more than when he had begun. Since the nightmare had featured a ground battle, he searched the army database for soldiers, regardless of name, matching his general description who were either retired or missing-in-action and presumed dead. When he had found nothing he had expanded his search to the navy and the RAF. Still nothing. A dead end.

John sat back and frowned at the computer. Now what?

What about the girl?

He had concentrated on searching for himself on the internet, but he hadn't searched for her, in part because there hadn't been a way of looking for someone based only on hair color. He hadn't known anything else about her, not her name, not what she looked like, not even if she was real. But now he knew she not only existed, but she was here, on the Powell Estate.

He retrieved his drawing and scanned it into his computer, but the photo recognition software couldn't get a match on the internet off of his drawing.

Another dead end.

He glanced at the clock and groaned. Not quite 8 am. And it was Sunday. He hated Sundays. They were so boring. The garage was closed on Sundays. And he had no odd jobs scheduled for the day. Maybe he'd go into work anyway, he decided.

Just as he was about to get up, the black cat jumped in his lap.

"You still here?" he asked with a quirk of one eyebrow. "You're not movin' in, you know." The cat butted her head against his hand and he sighed. "Alright, let's get you something to eat. But then I'm puttin' you out, because you're not movin' in."

The cat just purred.

~oOo~

The next morning Rose slowly awoke in her room in the TARDIS. Although she couldn't rightly remember, she knew she had dreamed of her first Doctor. Right after the Doctor had regenerated, she had dreamed of his previous self every night, but it had been months since the last time.

She closed her eyes and buried her head back in her pillow, trying to recapture her dream. But there was no use. She was too awake.

Yawning widely, she sat up and stretched, wondering what time it was. She didn't have a clock in her room in the TARDIS. There was no real point. No job, no set schedule, and, as the Doctor frequently reminded her, no time in the conventional sense aboard the TARDIS either. With time travel, she could wake up only to find herself on a planet that was entering its nighttime hours or vice versa. When she had first begun traveling with him she had developed a killer case of jet lag trying to keep track of where and when they were, until the Doctor told her not to worry about it and work within her own circadian rhythms.

But they were on the Estate, and there was actual linear time there, so if they were stuck there for a while she might actually need a clock. She shuddered in disgust. She hadn't needed a clock since she had worked at Henrik's.

After showering and getting dressed, Rose stopped by Mickey's room. He wasn't there. Nor was he in the kitchen. Neither was the Doctor. After having a much needed cup of tea from the perfectly hot, never empty pot on the counter, she looked around for Mickey a bit more before wandering into the TARDIS console room. It looked empty. Only the telltale whirr of the Doctor's sonic screwdriver told her he was there somewhere.

She found him sitting on the floor, wedged under the console. He was sonicking something that looked almost like a glowing aubergine while disconnected wires, bits of electronics, and other things that looked more grown than made hung around him. Nearby was a box containing a half-dozen more of the egg-shaped things while another one lay on the grating next to him. That one had a smoky appearance to it, almost as if it was a giant, burned out light bulb.

She stood there for more than a minute before he realized she was there.

"Oh, Rose," he said when he finally noticed her. "You're up."

_Well spotted_ , she thought, biting back the sarcastic reply. She was still irritated by his ignoring her the previous night. But that wasn't fair to him, she reminded herself. He was busy with a crisis, and it wasn't his job to pay attention to her. "What are you doing?" she asked instead.

"Replacing some ganglionic circuits from the TARDIS's neural net," he told her. He pointed the sonic at a couple of the hanging wires. They moved towards one another, twisting themselves together and reattaching themselves. When they were finished, it was impossible to see where one had ended and the other had begun. "And I'm almost finished. Unfortunately the static in the CCTV playback was more than static. It was actual damage to the TARDIS's memory core itself." He pointed his sonic screwdriver at the aubergine thing again. As the sonic whirred, its glow brightened.

"Do you know where Mickey is?" she asked.

"Did you check his room?"

She rolled her eyes. "Yes."

"Kitchen?"

"Yes."

"Game room?"

"Yes."

"Swimming pool?"

"He's really not much of a swimmer," she told him.

"Library? No, he wouldn't be there," the Doctor said, answering his own question.

Before Rose could defend him, Mickey burst into the TARDIS, breathing hard as if he had just run a long distance flat out. He bent over, putting his hands on his knees, and gasped for air.

"I am so out of shape," he complained.

"Where were you?" she asked.

"My flat," he told her. "I found out someone paid my rent for six months in advance. But that's not important." He turned to the Doctor. "I know where he is."

~oOo~

"I was just walkin' down the street, on my way back to the TARDIS, when I saw him," Mickey said for the fifth time as they stood across the street from the auto repair shop. Unlike the day before, since it was Sunday morning the street was almost deserted. "He was comin' out of the bakery eatin' a doughnut and carryin' a cup of coffee so I followed him."

"And he went into the garage," the Doctor said. It was clear he wanted less to clarify what Mickey had said than to just stop him repeating himself again.

"Yeah," Mickey answered.

"Hmm." The Doctor cocked his head and stared at the garage thoughtfully. "Well, assuming he's still in there, this is probably my best chance to get a good look at him. What's the best way to get in there unnoticed?"

"Through the office?" Rose suggested.

"It'll be locked," Mickey warned, "and before you suggest unlocking it with your sonic, there's an alarm. Same as the back way."

"I could silence the alarm," the Doctor said, "but he'd still hear the door open and close."

"Y'know, if all you want is to take a look at him, there's a couple of windows in the back. They've got bars across them, but we always keep them open at least a little for ventilation."

The Doctor's mouth twisted into a small grin. "That might work," he said. "You two stay here."

Darting between two parked cars, he took off across the street. Rose started to follow, and Mickey grabbed her arm.

"He said to stay here," he said.

"And since when did either of us ever listen to him?" she asked. She shook off his hand and followed the Doctor, and after a moment's hesitation Mickey followed her.

In the alley behind the garage, the Doctor was standing on a dustbin which had been rolled against the wall and was looking into one of the narrow windows along the eaves. Rose quickly climbed up next to him. She could hear the quiet strains of classical music filtering through the open window.

The Doctor didn't show any surprise at seeing her there.

"Did you see him?" she whispered. He placed a finger over his lips and then gestured at the window. She peeked in.

At first she couldn't see anyone, but then she spotted someone's legs sticking out from under the bright red Vectra in the repair bay directly in front of them. Although it was impossible to see who it was, she knew it was him, if for no other reason than she recognized his heavy black work boots.

"You think that's the man you saw yesterday?" the Doctor whispered.

Rose moved her mouth close to the Doctor's ear. "Yeah, that's him."

"Are you certain?"

"Yes," she said firmly. "Do you feel that echo you were talking about?"

The Doctor shook his head. He pulled his sonic out of a pocket and aimed it through the window. The tip lit up in blue, but she couldn't hear its familiar whirr. In the distance, a dog began to bark.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"The sonic is capable of producing sounds that Time Lords can hear but are far above the range of human hearing," he told her.

Rose looked back in the window. John Smith hadn't moved from his position under the car.

"One more scan," the Doctor said in a low voice. This time the sonic made a quiet whirr, barely audible to Rose even though she was right next to it. The Doctor's brow furrowed as he examined the readings. "He's not a Time Lord. He's completely, one hundred percent human."

"So that's not you after all," Rose said. "He just looks like the old you." She was surprised to feel a wave of disappointment.

"It's a little more complicated than that," the Doctor began, but he was interrupted by a loud crash. They turned as one towards the source of the sound. Mickey had rounded the corner and tripped over a wheelie bin. It had upturned and spilled its contents all over the alley.

Rose heard a sound coming from the inside of the garage and turned back to the window. John Smith had rolled out from under the car he had been working on and was headed towards the back entrance. She nudged the Doctor.

"Time to go!" he said. He hopped off the dustbin and caught Rose as she jumped off. The three ran, rounding the corner just before the back door opened. As they ran, Rose heard a familiar voice coming from the alley behind her.

"What a mess," John said loudly. "Stupid apes."

~oOo~

Back at the TARDIS, the Doctor immediately returned to his position underneath the console. "It's even more important now that I find out exactly what happened," he told them. He quickly replaced the remaining burned out globules.

"Because he wasn't you?" Rose asked.

"No," he replied. "Because he was."

"What?" Rose gaped at him. "But… but… you said he was human. One hundred percent human. If he's human, how is he you?"

"I don't think I can recover all of the missing CCTV footage," the Doctor said, ignoring her question. He pulled his glasses out of his pocket and pushed them on as he stood. With one slender finger he flipped a switch on one of the control panels and the whole room went black except for the console. The faint glow cast odd shadows around the room and gave his skin a bluish cast. "Most of the sections that are missing are too badly damaged to recover, but I don't think I really need them. The most important bit is at the end. I _have_ managed to enhance the footage we've already seen, though. If I can just get an additional second or two to play back in addition to that, it might be all we need."

"Doctor, if he's you, why is he human?" Rose asked.

He looked up and met her eyes. "That's what I'm trying to figure out."

"Right." _Stupid question_ , she thought to herself.

The Doctor threw a lever forward. A hologram of the very room they were in superimposed itself on the real console room, making the room look like a 3-D movie being watched without the special glasses they always gave you. Rose was surprised to see minute changes had been made over time, changes she had never noticed. A switch and a dial were currently reversed from their original placement on the console. The door leading deeper into the TARDIS was a different shape than it had been. And the jump seat was not only a foot away from its original location but it was larger as well.

The holographic TARDIS door opened and the translucent shape of Rose's first Doctor walked into the room and crossed to the console. He wandered around it, flipping switches carelessly. He stopped in his tracks and winced before continuing to program in the next set of coordinates.

"Stop," said the current Doctor, and the image froze. He walked to the console and examined the controls. "Looks like I just programmed the coordinates for the Powell Estate."

"So… if the coordinates are set for the Estate, is this when you were coming back for me?" Rose asked.

"Yeah, must be," he told her. He looked up at the ceiling. "Forward, normal speed."

The holographic Doctor began to move again. Grimacing, he rolled his left shoulder and tilted his head left and right as if he was trying to relieve a cramp in his neck.

Smoke began to rise from somewhere within the console, and for a second Rose thought it was real. She only realized it was part of the holographic display when the younger Doctor reacted to the sight.

"No, no, no, no, no!" he shouted. He rushed around the console, appearing to run through the current Doctor. He pulled his sonic screwdriver out of the pocket of his leather jacket. As he began to sonic one of the control panels, his TARDIS lurched. He leaned forward and grabbed onto a protrusion near the central column while he continued to use his screwdriver on the panel.

"Freeze," the current Doctor said. He leaned through the hologram of his previous self and examined the controls. "Hmm. I seemed to have bumped the chrono-temporal relay switch. Reset the arrival time for… Huh. New Year's Eve, 2006." He frowned.

"That was six months ago!" Mickey exclaimed.

"But… but we were on the Estate then," Rose said to the Doctor. "We didn't leave until a few days after that." She gestured at the holographic Doctor currently sprawled all over the console. "Do you mean that you and… you were both there at the same time?"

He looked over his glasses at her. "Me? I don't mean anything." He looked puzzled for a moment. "No, that's _The Restaurant at the End of the Universe_ ," he said. He glanced at the ceiling. "Forward."

The entire image shimmered and was replaced by static. The Doctor pulled his sonic screwdriver out of his pinstriped pocket and aimed it at one of the controls. The holographic console room reappeared. The leather-clad Doctor was hunched over in pain. He staggered a few steps forward and fell to his knees before collapsing on the floor. In the background they could hear the Cloister Bell ringing, but weakly, as if from a far way off. The helmet that the Doctor had shown her before dropped from the ceiling and fitted itself to the holographic Doctor's head.

"Freeze," the pinstriped Doctor said again. He walked over to his previous self and knelt beside him. He pointed at the helmet. "That's a Chameleon Arch. Has the capability of rewriting a Time Lord's entire biology, changing every cell and turning him into a completely different species. This piece," he pointed out a circular part in front, "stores the Time Lord's true identity while he's in another form. It appears that the TARDIS used the Chameleon Arch to turn me human for some reason." He grimaced. "Could have been worse, I suppose. She could have turned me into anything. Could have ended up a Denebian slime devil or a Canidine Rosikan or something. Could have even ended up as a Slitheen."

Rose slowly walked over to the hologram of her first Doctor and crouched next to him. Now that she could get a closer look at it, she realized the Chameleon Arch didn't really look much like a helmet at all. The metal structure had a main arch that stretched across the top of his head from side to side, held in place with horizontal bars that clamped onto the sides of his head and large disks that pressed against his temples. Another secondary arch stretched from the central arch to his forehead, holding the circular thing the Doctor had pointed out tightly against his younger self's forehead. It appeared to be a silver fob watch, not unlike the one her great-grandfather had had, but this one had the Doctor's circular language engraved into the lid.

Despite being unconscious, the holographic Doctor's face was twisted in pain. Biting her lower lip, she reached out a hand as if to touch him before pulling it back. She drew in a shaky breath.

"Wouldn't that hurt, changing species like that?" Mickey asked

"Yes," the Doctor said shortly. He began to wander the room, ducking his head to look under the jump seat and behind the coral struts. "The only reason she would do something like this is if there was no other choice. The real question is what that was."

At his matter-of-fact tone, Rose stared at him in disbelief. He sounded as if he didn't care what the other Doctor had gone through. _Same man_ , she reminded herself finally. He might not remember it, but he's the one who went through it.

"What are you lookin' for?" Mickey asked.

"The TARDIS locked me out, therefore she's been injured. I'm trying to figure out what could have caused it. I'm also looking for anything out of place," the Doctor answered. "Like this." He pointed under the console. A holographic sonic screwdriver lay on the grating under it. "I must have dropped it when I collapsed."

Mickey and Rose joined in the search, but they couldn't find anything.

"Forward, one quarter speed," the Doctor said.

The Cloister Bell resumed its weak tolling. As they watched, the holographic Chameleon Arch detached itself from the younger Doctor's head and withdrew into the ceiling of the console room, leaving the fob watch on the floor in front of the Doctor's face. The light illuminating the holographic console room flickered, briefly turning mauve before returning to its normal color. The grating under the Doctor rose up on one end, causing him to roll towards the door. It opened by itself.

As the holographic Doctor rolled from one section of grating to another, new sections of the floor would rise up, slowly forcing him towards the door and out of the TARDIS. Then the door shut behind him. The light began to flicker in mauve again.

"Stop!" the pinstriped Doctor yelled, and the image froze. He rushed to the door and knelt down, staring at something on the floor. When he looked up again, his face was visibly pale, made worse by the mauve light shining on his face.

"What is it?" Rose asked.

"The fob watch. It got stuck on the floor between the ramp and the threshold of the door. It's still in the other TARDIS, and as long as it's there, he can't change back."


	6. Chapter Five

**Chapter Five**

The Doctor turned back to the image of the fob watch on the floor. “This is bad. And when I say it’s bad, it’s not just a boatload of bad or a planet worth of bad. This is bad with a capital B.A.D.: a galaxy worth of bad with a TARDIS worth of bad on top.”

“Y’know, I’m not stupid,” Mickey said, “but I don’t know what the heck you’re talkin’ about. What’s bad, and what does a watch have to do with it?”

The Doctor sighed and pointed to the watch again. “That, right there, that contains me. The Chameleon Arch not only changes my species but stores my Time Lord consciousness within that watch for safe keeping.”

“Well, if you’re there,” Mickey asked dubiously, “who’s that out there in the garage? You said it was you.”

“It is… sort of. A human brain can’t contain a Time Lord consciousness. It would burn up from the inside out. That person there in the garage is me… but not me. He has none of my memories, none of my abilities, none of my genetics… everything that would make him a Time Lord is gone.” He stood up and walked to the monitor. “The TARDIS will have produced an entire backstory, invented an entire life history for me and integrated me in society. That’s who I’ll remember, that’s who I’ll think I am, that’s who I’ll be… not me. Of course that’s assuming…” His voice dwindled off.

“Assuming what?” Rose asked in a quiet voice.

He turned to her. She was standing on the other side of the console with her arms crossed in front of her as if she was hugging herself.

He flipped some switches. The console room's lights turned back on, and the hologram of the previous TARDIS console room faded. “That’s assuming that the TARDIS was capable of creating an identity for me at that point,” he told her. “It’s clear that whatever happened to me was a crisis I couldn’t handle on my own. That’s why the TARDIS took matters into her own hands, so to speak. But we know the TARDIS had also been injured. The Cloister Bell, the mauve lights… not to mention she locked me out. She wouldn’t have done that if something catastrophic hadn’t happened to her.”

“You told me about the Cloister Bell,” Mickey said, “but what’re the mauve lights about?”

“Mauve is the universal color of emergencies,” Rose told him.

“Mauve? Whatever happened to red?”

Rose shook her head. “Later, Mick.” She turned the Doctor. “So, if I understand this right, we have an injured TARDIS, and a Time Lord who isn’t a Time Lord anymore.”

“And can’t change back until we get access to the watch,” the Doctor said. “And the real question is: what injured both of us?”

“And why did it take the TARDIS so long to send out a distress signal?” Rose asked. “You said the TARDIS was set to arrive on New Year’s, which means it arrived while we were still here. Why didn’t we get a distress call then, or while we were at the school?”

“She must have been so badly injured she was too weak to send out a signal until now,” the Doctor answered.

Mickey shook his head. “I’m still missing something. Why is this such a crisis? You said the TARDIS can heal itself, so why does it need us? Not only that, but we know you eventually got back to normal. I mean, you aren’t still stuck as a human. You’re right here.”

“Time doesn’t work that way, particularly for Time Lords,” the Doctor told him. “What is happening to him now is happening. Whatever we do here and now will affect that.”

“But wouldn’t us doing anything to change what happened create a paradox or something?” Rose asked. 

“Yes. Or no,” he told her. “I don’t remember any of this, so I don’t know if we are risking changing things or if we were originally part of events. But things are different for Time Lords. It’s possible for a Time Lord to make changes in his own timeline without creating a paradox. Not to mention that the TARDIS herself called us back. That more than anything else tells me that she needs us to help.” He shook his head. “I need more information. Rose, you told me that you saw photos of me from events I don’t remember. I’m going to have to retrace my steps to get more information.”

Rose nodded, and then her brow furrowed. “Hang on. _You_ are going to have to retrace your steps? Don’t you mean _we_ have to retrace your steps?”

“No,” he said. “I want, no, I _need_ you to stay here.”

She stared at him in shock. “What? Why?”

“Rose, I am out there alone,” he said. “Physically I might be human, I may even think I’m human, but I’m really not. I need someone to watch over me, make sure I don’t get in trouble, make sure I don’t hurt anyone, make sure I don’t get involved in big, historical events, that sort of thing.”

“How am I supposed to do that if I can’t even let you see me?”

He gritted his teeth and rubbed his forehead vigorously. “I don’t see a way around it. You’ll have to get to know me. According to Mickey, on some level I remember you. I'll instinctively trust you. That should make things, well perhaps not easy, but easier.” 

At the look on her face, a look that was a combination of doubt and worry and nervousness, he suddenly remembered the conversation he had had with her after she had met Sarah Jane.

“ _You just leave us behind…_ ”

And almost immediately after telling her he wouldn’t, he had. And on an abandoned spaceship in the future no less.

No wonder she didn’t believe him. Particularly because she was at home. She had to believe he wasn’t going to come back for her.

“I’m coming back,” he promised. “I told you, I’m not leaving you behind. This is just temporary. And I’m leaving you with me.” Despite his words, she still looked doubtful. “How can I prove…” he said to himself. He glanced around the room. And spotted Mickey. “Mr. Mickey!”

“What?” A suspicious look crossed Mickey’s face.

“You’ll help me out, won’t you?”

“I guess,” Mickey answered slowly.

“There, you see!” the Doctor said. He gave them each a bright smile. “That solves everything!” 

They stared at him blankly.

“What do you mean?” Rose asked. “What does it solve?”

“Mickey can come with _me_ , while you can stay here with, well, me,” the Doctor told her.

“What?” she asked incredulously.

At the same time Mickey said, “Now wait a minute…”

“This way,” the Doctor continued to Rose, cutting off Mickey’s objections, “you know I’ll be back. Since you know there’s no way I’d _ever_ want to travel with Mickey permanently.”

“Oi!” Mickey interjected.

“So while you stay here, keeping me from getting into trouble,” the Doctor said, “Mickey and I will be trying to figure out how to solve whatever it is that’s going on.” He flashed her another bright smile. “Besides, Time Machine. I’ll be back before you know it. I can be back ten seconds after I’ve left.”

“If you’re going to be back in ten seconds,” she said, “why do I need to stay?”

“Well…” He took a deep breath and let it out in a rush. He grimaced and yanked on one ear. It was one of his many tells in this body for not wanting to admit something, but it was something he couldn’t seem to control. “Just in case I’m late,” he said.

Rose stared at him, shaking her head slightly in disbelief. “So when’s this all supposed to happen?” she asked.

“As soon as possible,” he told her. “Preferably now. No better time than the present, as they say. Now that we know more about what’s going on and have a plan of action, the TARDIS should let us take off.” He shrugged apologetically. “Sooner we go, sooner we can get back.”

Rose nodded. “S’pose I should go… get my stuff.” 

Troubled by the way the conversation had gone, the Doctor watched her walk out of the room. After she had left, he turned back to the controls, only to see Mickey staring at him incredulously. The younger man opened his mouth to say something, and then abruptly shut it. 

“What?” the Doctor asked.

Mickey rolled his eyes. “And you think I’m thick. If you don’t know, nothin’ I say is gonna change that,” he said and followed Rose out of the room.

~oOo~

 

When Mickey got to Rose’s bedroom, she was pulling t-shirts and jeans out of her dresser and tossing them onto the bed.

“Wanna pull my rucksack out of the cupboard for me, Mick?” she asked without turning.

“Is that all you’re gonna say?” he asked as he walked across the room. He pulled the bag out and put it on the bed next to her clothes.

“What am I supposed to say?” she asked.

“Uh, I dunno, maybe that he’s bein’ a stupid twat leavin’ you here?”

“And what good would that do?” She opened another drawer and pulled out underclothes and socks. “Besides, he’s right. I should stay here.”

“You’re kiddin’, right?”

“No.” She crossed to the bed and started to shove the clothes into her rucksack. 

“Are you ever gonna stop defending him?” he asked.

“He’s got a point. Someone really should be here to make sure _he_ doesn’t get in trouble.”

“He’s been here six months and the planet hasn’t blown up yet. What makes now any different?”

Rose didn’t answer. Instead she walked into the en suite. Mickey followed her. He watched as she loaded her makeup into a bright pink toiletries bag. 

“C’mon, what makes now any different?”

She ignored him. Once she had finished, she picked up the bag and pushed passed him. 

“Rose, talk to me,” Mickey urged.

She angrily shoved the bag into the rucksack. “What do you want me to say? That I don’t want to stay here? Alright, I don’t want to stay!” She tried to zip up the pack and the zipper got stuck. “Damn it!” she said as she tried to force it. “It doesn’t want to close!”

Mickey gently pushed her away and easily zipped it up. With a heavy sigh, Rose sank down on the edge of the bed and put her head in her hands. 

“I don’t want to stay here,” she said again.

“Well, I don’t want to go with him.”

Rose gasped and finally turned to face him. “Oh, I’m sorry. I forgot about that.”

“Y’know, if I don’t go with him, maybe he won’t make you stay here.”

“If he doesn’t want me with him, I don’t want to be here either, whatever his reasons,” she told him. “But he needs someone.”

“Sarah Jane said he just wants an entourage to show off to,” he said.

Rose shook her head. “She was wrong. ‘S more than that. He doesn’t just want someone with him. He _needs_ someone with him. He doesn’t do well alone.”

"Yeah, I've seen how much trouble he gets into with someone. What must happen when he's by himself?" 

"Evidently he ends up having to have the TARDIS turn him human," she said.

Mickey began to chuckle. “You realize what this means, don’t you? You’re supposed to babysit him.”

She laughed and bumped his shoulder with hers. “So are you!” she answered. She sighed. “How am I supposed to do this? It’s gonna look awfully suspicious if I just start following him around.”

“Yeah, you could get arrested as a stalker!” he said, still laughing. “I dunno, Rose. Maybe you could go undercover again, the way you did at the school.”

She rolled her eyes. “I really don’t think he needs a dinner lady, Mick,” she told him. Then she paused thoughtfully. “But you’re right. I could go undercover. But not as a dinner lady. Wasn’t the garage needing more help in the office?”

“Yeah, they were,” he said.

“If I could get a job there, I’d have a way to keep an eye on him without him knowing about it.” She laughed ruefully. “Mum would be thrilled to have me back and working at the garage. She’s hated me traveling with the Doctor. She even thought the shop was giving me ‘airs and graces’.”

“Just wait till she finds out that the only reason you’re doin’ it is to keep an eye on the Doctor,” Mickey said. “And not this one either. Maybe I do want to be gone.”

She laughed again and then grew serious. “Do you mind staying with him?”

“I have to admit I’m not happy about it,” he answered. “But I’ll do it. But for you. Not for him.”

“Thanks, Mick.” 

~oOo~

The Doctor was bent over the controls when he heard Rose and Mickey reenter the console room. “Looks like she’ll let us take off now,” he told them.

“Then it’s time for me to go, yeah?” Rose asked.

He looked up and at the sight of her his hearts squeezed painfully. She had a huge rucksack slung over one shoulder. Not for the first time he regretted the necessity of making her stay. “Looks like you’re moving out,” he said lightly. “I said ten seconds.”

“You also said you might be late,” she reminded him. “This is just in case.” After an awkward pause she continued. “Well, I guess I’d better go.” She made her way out the door, and they followed her out.

Once outside, Mickey gave her a kiss on the cheek. “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of him for you,” he whispered to her.

She pulled him into a tight hug. “Thanks,” she whispered back.

As Mickey returned to the TARDIS, Rose turned to the Doctor. “Ten seconds,” he promised. 

She bit her lip and nodded and then gave him a forced smile. “Ten seconds. I’m gonna hold you to that.”

He smiled back, and they stood there awkwardly for a moment. And then he remembered something. “Oh, I almost forgot,” he said, reaching deep into his pocket. He pulled out a white cube approximately the side of his fist and handed it to her. 

“What is it?” she asked.

“Instructions. Just in case,” he said. “There’s a tiny button on the bottom.”

As she turned it over to look, he was suddenly seized by an almost overwhelming desire to kiss her goodbye as Mickey had. The Doctor shoved the impulse away from him.

“See you later,” he said instead.

She looked up and gave him a small grin. “Not if I see you first.”

Knowing if he didn’t go soon he wouldn’t go at all, he turned and rushed back into the TARDIS. As he crossed to the console, the door closed behind him. 

Mickey sat back on the jump seat, arms crossed, waiting for him.

“I can’t believe you’re actually doin’ it,” he said. “You’re leavin’ Rose behind.” He shook his head in disbelief. “And you used to call me an idiot. Who’s the idiot now?”

The Doctor didn’t reply. Instead, with a jerk on the controls, he sent them into the Time Vortex.

~oOo~

John wandered the aisles of the tiny Tesco Express on his way home from the garage. The selection was limited, but the store had the advantage of being just down the street from the auto shop and he rarely if ever needed anything that they didn’t have.

It was still fairly early, not quite half three, but he had finished up the repairs on the Vectra and didn’t want to start on another car. Tomorrow would be soon enough. Besides, it was supposed to be his day off, so once he had put his tools away—unlike some of the other stupid apes that worked there—he locked up and headed out. He had stopped by Tesco’s on a whim because he had been planning on a takeaway curry for tea rather than anything he could get at the store. 

He tossed a few more items in the shopping basket to join the tea and milk already there and made his way back to the front of the store. Unlike usual, there was no queue and he went directly to the checkout counter. The cashier was someone he knew, a pretty brunette somewhere in her mid-thirties. He gave her a grin as he put the basket on the counter.

“John, two days in a row!” she said, giving him a bright grin back. “That’s rare for you.”

“Unexpected houseguest, Beth,” he told her. “Didn’t have anything in she might like.”

Beth’s smile faltered. “She?” she asked. 

“Yeah, little black cat,” he told her. “Wandered in yesterday.”

Beth’s grin returned. “You’ve got a cat? I should have guessed from the tuna and the sardines.”

“No, I don’t have a cat,” he informed her. “She’s not staying.”

“If you feed her, you won’t be able to get rid of her,” Beth warned. “Especially if you feed her this stuff. You know we do have cat food.”

He shuddered. “Wouldn’t feed that stuff to a barnysnape.”

“A barnysnape? Is that something from Harry Potter?”

His brow furrowed in confusion. “Is that what I said?” he asked. “A barnysnape?” He shook his head to clear it. “Must be from Harry Potter. Sure sounds like it at least. But I meant to say I wouldn’t feed it to a dog.”

He paid for his purchases and started towards the door. Then he stopped and turned back. “Beth, I’m looking for a girl,” he said. 

Beth raised her eyebrows in surprise, an expression that quickly turned into a smirk. “Really?” she asked flirtatiously. “Any specific one?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I don’t know her name but she’s yay high,” he held his hand up a little over his shoulder, “long blonde hair, maybe a decade younger than you? Wears hoop earrings?”

She scowled. “No,” she said shortly. “I don’t know anyone like that.”

“Well, if you see someone like that, will you let me know?” 

“Not bloody likely,” she muttered under her breath. At his expectant expression, she let out a huff of frustration. “Okay, all right,” she said.

He gave her a wide grin. “Fantastic.”

~oOo~

As the sound of the TARDIS’s engines echoed through the neighborhood and slowly faded away, Rose watched as the TARDIS disappeared before her eyes. 

It felt so wrong for it to leave without her.

“Ten seconds,” she whispered. “You said ten seconds, Doctor. One. Two. Three…”

But after ten seconds it stubbornly stayed gone.

“Alright, ten more. One. Two. Three. Four…”

Still gone. She felt a wave of empathy for Sarah Jane. Until this moment she hadn’t truly understood what the older woman must have felt when she had been left behind. Even the Doctor sending her away from the Game Station hadn’t felt like this.

With a rush Rose wondered if this was a little like what her mother felt whenever the TARDIS left with her aboard, wondering if when the TARDIS disappeared whether it would ever come back. 

She waited several more minutes but the TARDIS didn’t return, so she shouldered her pack and slowly began the walk back to her mum’s flat.

~oOo~

As John crossed the courtyard to his building, in the distance he heard the rough sound of engines. He stopped in his tracks. He frowned. There was something familiar about the sound, something he couldn’t place. Before he could identify it, the noise slowly faded away.

“Well, whatever it was,” he said to himself, “it sure needs a tune up.”


	7. Chapter Six

**Chapter Six**

For the second time in two days Rose made her way across the Estate. The weather was hot and muggy, warmer than usual for July, and before she had arrived at Bucknall House she was drenched in sweat.

Still, instead of rushing to the relative cool of the building, she slowed with every step, dreading the unavoidable conversation with her mother. Not necessarily about why she was back, although that was part of it, but why she was back alone. And with most of her stuff.

How would she explain the Doctor leaving her here in a way that made sense to her mum? She only partially understood it herself. And how could she tell her she had no idea how long she’d be here? How to avoid her mother’s gloating, the pressure to stay, the inevitable “I told you so” if she let her insecurities slip about being left behind? Because she couldn’t talk about her fears about being left behind without mentioning Sarah Jane and Reinette, and knowing about them would in her mother’s mind confirm every bad thing she had ever thought about the Doctor since they had met.

And how could she avoid explaining that the person Jackie knew as John was really the Doctor? Despite her being one of the worst gossips on the Estate, Rose knew her mother had never let the Doctor’s true identity as a time traveling alien slip. But if her mum met John again, and Rose had no doubt she would, how could she prevent her mother saying something to him about it?

She groaned. Not only was she hot and sweaty, now she was developing a massive headache.

Rose was so wrapped up in her thoughts that she arrived at her mother’s flat without realizing it. She pulled her key out of her pocket and let herself in.

“Mum,” she called, closing the door behind her. “Mum, I’m back.”

“I’m in the lounge,” her mother called back.

Rose dropped her rucksack in her old bedroom before making her way to the back of the flat. She found her mother sitting on the sofa, nursing a cup of tea while the telly blared. Rose moved a stack of gossip magazines off one of the chairs to the coffee table before sitting down herself.

“I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it,” Jackie said. “The Doctor said you’d be back today. So where is himself then?”

“Back in the TARDIS with Mickey,” Rose answered evasively. “Mum, is it okay if I stay here for a couple of days?”

“Why?” her mother asked suspiciously. “What’s goin’ on?”

Before Rose could answer, the phone rang. As Jackie picked up, Rose sighed in relief.

“Stuart!” Jackie exclaimed and then her voice lowered suggestively. “Yeah, of course I had a good time last night. A real good time…”

Despite being grateful for the interruption, Rose rolled her eyes. “Saved by the bell,” she muttered under her breath. “And Stuart.”

As her mother left the room to talk in private, Rose grabbed the remote control and flipped through the television stations. Only then she remembered it was Sunday afternoon. Nothing on. Nothing of interest at any rate. She had been back at the flat a total of five minutes and she was bored already. She snapped off the telly just as her mother reentered the room.

“I’m goin’ out with Stuart tonight,” Jackie told her. “He’s comin’ to pick me up in a half an hour.” Then she frowned. “Unless you need me to stay home, Rose. Because I will if you need me.”

Rose shook her head. “No, you go.” She gave her mum a smile. “Have a good time.”

“Oh, I will,” Jackie told her with a cheeky grin.

As her mother left the room to get ready for her date, Rose returned to her bedroom. She began to pull her things out of her bag only to find the odd cube the Doctor had given her. After the TARDIS had left, she had jammed it in the bag and hadn’t given it another thought.

She closed the door to the room before sinking down on the bed and flipping the switch on the bottom. When she turned it right side up again, a six inch hologram of the Doctor appeared. He had obviously recorded it while she was getting ready to go; he was wearing the same white shirt and brown tie with the light blue diamonds on it he had been wearing earlier. He had the top two buttons done up on his jacket, and his hands were jammed deeply in his trouser pockets.

“Rose, if you’re watching this, it means I’ve been gone longer than ten seconds,” he said. “I’m really sorry about that. I truly meant to come back in ten seconds. All I can say is that maybe whatever is going on with his TARDIS is beginning to affect mine.”

“Or maybe you’re just a lousy driver,” she said under her breath.

“Now Rose, in this situation there are a number of things to remember,” the Doctor’s hologram continued. “First of all, like I said before, he’s not me. Well, he is, but in all the important ways he isn’t. The TARDIS will have given him a completely new identity, and he will believe that that’s who he is. It’s essential to let him continue to believe it. According to Mickey, he has some residual memory of you, but that doesn’t mean he knows who he really is—which is me—or who you are and how he knows you. If you end up having direct contact with him, it’s essential that you give him as little information as possible so that he doesn’t begin to suspect he isn’t who he thinks he is, because if he does begin to suspect he isn’t who he thinks he is, he could have a crisis of identity which could make this whole bad situation a hundred times worse. Is that clear?”

“As mud,” she said. 

“Second, very important, based on where he is in his timeline, this will be after we dealt with the Nestene Consciousness but before we traveled together. You mustn’t let slip anything about our future together. Maintain the timelines at all cost. After all this is over, because of our involvement he’ll have to forget all this happened. That will be much harder if he knows even the slightest detail of our adventures together.

“C, keep him away from major historical events. As a human, he won’t have the insight into the flow of time that I do normally, and when I get back I don’t need to be cleaning up messes in the timeline that I’ve created by mucking about while I’m human.”

Rose rolled her eyes. “Okay, keep him away from all the world-changing events that happen on the Estate every day.”

“Fifth... or… fourth?” The image of the Doctor paused, and Rose could see his forehead furrow thoughtfully. The hologram began to pace. It was an odd sight, seeing him walk back and forth across the surface of the cube. “Fourth,” he said decisively after a moment. He pulled a hand out of his pocket and raked it through his hair. “This may be the most important of all. Don’t let him hurt anyone,” the Doctor said. “I was very volatile when I was him, and obviously being human is just going to make that worse. After all, you know how humans can be. You should, after all, being one yourself, and, well, you know how you can get…” 

Rose scowled. “You should be glad you aren’t here, because you’re just asking for a slap. You know that, don’t you?” 

“Now this one is fifth. If anything happens to me, him, if I’m on the verge of dying or something, try to get into the TARDIS and get the watch. If she heals a little more, she might let you in. If you do manage to get the watch, then get me to open it. Don’t open it yourself. Only I can open it for it to work… the Chameleon Arch will have tied opening it to my genetics. Only by my opening it will it return me to being a Time Lord. But this is only as a last resort. We don’t know what’s going on yet, why the TARDIS turned me human in the first place, and it might be a greater risk to turning me back than for me to stay human.

“Last, but nowhere near least…” He stopped in his tracks and turned to stare straight at her. It looked like he could see her, like he was looking deeply into her eyes. It was disconcerting, just as it had been when Emergency Program One had played in the TARDIS console room. “Rose, knowing me, I didn’t say thank you for taking care of me. Thank you. I know this won’t be easy. Hopefully it won’t take long for Mickey and me to find out what’s going on and get back. If you encounter a situation you think you don’t know how to handle, just use your best judgment. I know you’ll do what’s best. You always do. There’s no one in the universe I believe in, no one I trust, more than you. See you soon.”

The image of the Doctor froze. Rose sniffed loudly and with her free hand she wiped at her eyes. “Git,” she said forcefully. “You’re such a jerk. Why can’t you say things like that when you’re really here, yeah? Why do you have to wait until you’re God knows where doing God knows what and will be back God knows when?” 

She flicked the switch at the bottom of the cube. The Doctor’s image flickered and then disappeared. She placed the cube on the bedside table next to her alarm clock before lying back and staring at the ceiling.

She missed him. He’d been gone all of a half an hour, and despite everything that had happened recently, she already missed him.

“Doctor,” she said to the empty room, “get back soon, alright? Just… get back soon.”

~oOo~

John carried his tea into the lounge: a curry courtesy of the Chinese takeaway across the street from the garage and a large bottle of still water from Tesco’s. He sat down and set the water on the coffee table before taking a bite of the curry. 

The food was cold. But what else could he expect? When he had gotten back to the flat, instead of eating he had immediately returned to the computer. As he did every day, he had spent hours there scanning the online newspapers and checking the most recent missing persons reports in the Scotland Yard database. As he had expected, there was nothing. Nothing new, nothing old, nothing in the numerous stories and files that could remotely be referring to him. But he had had to check, just in case. You never knew.

And he hadn’t made any progress in finding information about the girl, either. No one seemed to know who she was. In addition to his boss’s wife and Beth at Tesco’s, he’d also asked the cashier at the takeaway and the two biggest gossips in his building, Irene and Gladys. No luck from any of them. He was beginning to think he imagined her. Oh, there had been someone with blonde hair at the garage, he was sure of that, Mudali had seen her as well. But that didn’t mean it was _her. She_ probably didn’t even exist. Only wishful thinking had made him think that the blonde and the girl from his dreams were one and the same.

He picked up the television remote and turned on a movie to watch while he ate. He didn’t really want to watch telly, but he needed some sort of noise in the place. The flat was always too quiet otherwise. For some reason when he was at home he always expected to hear a background hum, beyond what the refrigerator and other electrical equipment provided. Without the sound of the television going, the flat was silent. It just served to emphasize how empty it was. 

And it _was_ empty. No one was ever there, other than him. No one ever visited. Not that he ever invited anyone, of course, but still. 

Even the cat wasn’t there.

John had put her out when he had left for work that morning. Although he didn’t want to admit it, when he had gotten home he had felt a twinge of disappointment when he had realized that the cat hadn’t returned. On some level he had hoped that she’d be there. Expected it even. 

But why would he expect that the cat would be interested in being part of his life? No one else was. 

“Now you’re just feelin’ sorry for yourself,” John said aloud. He took a swig from the bottle of water and wished he had thought to pick up something stronger. Anything to rid himself of his foul mood. Even beer wouldn’t cut it right now. He thought about going out, but he wasn’t in the mood for a pub. Despite feeling lonely and sorry for himself, he detested the thought of sitting at a bar with a bunch of drunken, stupid apes. 

“Beer it is then,” he said to himself.

He retrieved the rest of the pack from the kitchen, sat back down on the sofa, and slowly began the process of getting as drunk as he could. 

~oOo~

Hot and sweaty and more than slightly disoriented, Rose woke up from a deep sleep not certain where she was. It wasn’t the first time she had woken up like that, not remembering where she had been when she had fallen asleep. And not because of her clubbing days. It seemed like a regular occurrence when traveling with the Doctor. She had woken up in as diverse places as the TARDIS console room, a dank cave on a planet in the distant past, and a filthy jail cell on a space station far in the future. As far as she knew she could be anywhere, and any when, in the universe.

“Doctor?” she whispered, yawning. “Doctor, where are we?” And then she remembered that the Doctor wasn’t there. And that she was in her old bedroom in her mum’s flat.

The room was stifling. The vents had never properly worked, and when the door was closed her room was often uncomfortably hot in the summer and freezing in the winter. 

Rose got up, combing her fingers through her hair as she crossed the room and opened the door. Across the hall, the door to her mother’s bedroom was closed. From behind it she could hear someone talking. She couldn’t hear what was being said, but the voice was distinctly male. Her mother giggled in response. She and Stuart must not have gone out after all.

So much for hanging out in the lounge, she thought. She really didn’t want to overhear them if, or more likely when, they ended up doing more than talking. With a sigh of inevitability, she made sure she had her keys in her pocket and slipped out the door. 

To her surprise it was twilight. She must have been asleep for hours.

When she got to the stairwell, instead of going down, she went up, headed to the roof. The roof had always been her place to escape to: when she was having problems in school, when she was fighting with her friends, and particularly when she needed to get away from her mum. 

It was empty when she got there. She was always surprised it wasn’t used more by the other residents of Bucknall House. She couldn’t imagine why. It was quiet, far above the chaos that was the Powell Estate. 

She hoisted herself up on a ledge and looked out over the city. Her mouth quirked into a smile at the memory of the last time she had been there. Last time she had been with the Doctor. Her first Doctor. Right after she had gotten home almost a year late and her mother had slapped him. 

She looked over at the building across the way and wondered if he was there. Even if he wasn’t, he’d certainly be at the garage tomorrow. She’d see him again, something she hadn’t dared hope for. She’d really see him again. Even though according to the Doctor he wasn’t really him and wouldn’t properly remember her, she’d still be able to see him again.

And for the first time since she had been left behind, she thought that maybe being left here wouldn’t be all bad.

~oOo~

John drained the can and roughly put it on the table next to four other empties. After five beers finished over the course of the evening he was definitely feeling it, but he wasn’t nearly drunk enough, he decided. Despite the noises outside, despite the hum of the refrigerator and the voices emanating from the telly, the flat was too quiet. And too small. The rooms were drab and dull and far, far too small. 

Really, he thought, the block of flats was too small. The Estate was too small. 

“Even bloody London is too small,” he said irritably. 

But there was one place that he had found didn’t feel too small.

He grabbed another beer and popped the top as he headed out of the flat.

Brandon House, the building his flat was in, was one of the tallest buildings on the Powell Estate and, by extension, Peckham. On clear days from the roof of the rundown block of flats you could see downtown London, but on clear nights you could see the stars. And thankfully tonight was one of those nights.

There was no moon and, in spite of the lights of the city, the stars were brilliant, so large he felt he could almost touch them. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. It was only here, under the stars, that he didn’t feel the weight of not knowing who he was or the claustrophobia of the small flat in the city. It was only here that he felt even a semblance of peace.

He placed the can of beer down on the ledge and leaned against it, arms crossed in front of his chest. Between the beer and the stars, he felt relaxed for the first time in what seemed like ages. Up here there was no job, no flat, no beans on toast… nothing but him and the stars.

Eventually he turned from the sky to take in his surroundings. There was a slight breeze, a little cool but welcome after the heat of the day. In the distance he could hear the quiet sounds of music playing and laughter, but they weren’t loud enough to disturb him. And he could see the silhouette of someone on the roof of a nearby building. He chuckled. He wasn’t the only one who felt the need to take refuge on a roof up above the city.

As he watched, the other person left, to reenter the building and rejoin the world of jobs and beans on toast, but he stayed at his post, watching the stars and breathing in the cool night air.

Breathing in freedom.

~oOo~

_Rose ran for her life down the narrow, paneled hall of 10 Downing Street. On either side of her, plastic hands emerged from doorways, grabbing at her as she passed._

_“Doctor!” she screamed. “Doctor, where are you?”_

_She glanced behind her. A host of shop dummies, arms outstretched, were gaining on her. She put on speed._

_Finally she could see the end. She rounded the corner—and stopped short. Panting and heart pounding, she looked around in amazement. Cement walls had replaced wood._

_She was in the bunker in Utah._

_“Doctor!” she yelled again. “Doctor, where are you?”_

_Suddenly she saw a thick rope hanging in front of her. She grabbed it—and the floor dropped out from under her._

_She found herself hanging from a barrage balloon over London during the Blitz. The rope cut into her hands while her feet dangled in space far above the ground. Explosions lit up the night, revealing tree people as tall as Big Ben towering over the city. Ghostlike Gelth swirled around her, taunting her._

_Her surroundings shifted yet again. Still hanging from the rope, she was now in the cavernous space under the London Eye. She quickly looked around and spotted the Doctor standing on the edge of a ledge, dwarfed by the Slitheen that surrounded him. Their green skin glowed with an unearthly hue in the darkness._

_“Doctor!”_

_She swung back and forth, gaining enough momentum to knock the Slitheen into the vat of living plastic below. As she swung back, dangerously over the vat, she slipped and strong, leather-clad arms caught her. She clung to him, burying her face in his shoulder._

_“Jeopardy friendly, you are,” he whispered into her hair. “But absolutely fantastic.”_

_“I missed you,” she told him. “I missed you so much.”_

_He tilted her chin up and looked deeply into her eyes. “I’m right here, Rose Tyler. And I’m not goin’ anywhere.”_

The harsh, repetitive blare of the alarm broke through Rose’s dream. She groaned in protest. As the dream faded, she instinctively slammed a hand on the clock as she had so many times before, first for school, and then while working. 

Yawning, she blearily opened her eyes and glanced at the clock. Half seven. She'd only had about five hours of sleep. She had gone to bed very late last night, or very early in the morning, after staying on the roof until she was certain her mother and Stuart were asleep.

But she had to get up. She had to apply for a job.

She winced. She liked to think of it as going undercover, but it was really getting a job. She hadn’t applied for a job in years. She hadn’t even had a job in years, not since Henrik’s had blown up. 

Rose forced herself out of bed and out of her room. Her mother’s bedroom door was closed, so she tiptoed to the bathroom for a shower. Even after she had gotten dressed, in the nicest top and trousers she had at the flat, she found that Jackie still wasn’t up. Relieved to be able to once again postpone talking to her mother, she left a note saying she’d be back later and headed out.

As she made her way down the stairs and across the courtyard, butterflies fluttered in her stomach at the thought of seeing him again. It’s not him, she told herself. It’s the Doctor, but not. The Doctor said that in every important way, it’s not him. Besides, you might not even see him today. In fact, the Doctor could come back and you might not see _him_ at all.

But the butterflies ignored her.

Finally Rose stood across the street from the garage. The shop was already open, and she could see that each of its bays was filled with vehicles in various stages of being repaired. To her disappointment, she couldn’t spot him among any of the mechanics working on the cars. 

She closed her eyes for a moment and silently rehearsed what she’d say. Finally she nodded.

“I can do this,” she told herself firmly. 

A bell attached to the door rang as she walked inside the office. To her relief, the same woman was behind the desk as had been there on Saturday. Good, she thought. That would make things easier. 

There were already a half a dozen people queued up in front of the desk, and half again as many sitting on the uncomfortable looking vinyl chairs in the waiting area. She joined the queue, and when it was her turn she stepped up to the desk. The woman looked up at her expectantly.

“Hello, Mrs. Mudali? My name’s Rose. Rose Tyler,” she began. “I was in the other day, Saturday, with Mickey Smith, and when I was here I heard you say that you needed more help at the desk, and if you have an opening, I want to apply for the job.” Before Mrs. Mudali could respond, Rose continued in a rush. “Now I don’t have any A-levels and my CV is a bit out of date, but I got really high scores on my GCSEs and I have worked at a shop before. If you hire me, I promise I’ll work really, really hard.”

Crossing her arms in front of her and resting them on her very pregnant belly, Mrs. Mudali cocked her head and scrutinized her. Her brow furrowed as she frowned. Rose shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot.

“Uh, do you need me to fill out a form or something?” Rose asked nervously. “Or references? You need references, yeah? I can get you some if you want.” She silently scanned her memory, trying to figure out if she still knew anyone who would vouch for her. As she drew a blank, she missed having access to the Doctor's psychic paper. This all would have been so easy with it, she thought. No wonder he used it so often.

After a moment the older woman’s mouth twisted into a small smile. “I’ve been praying for weeks for someone to come in here and offer to help. I was just trying to figure out which of the gods sent you to me before I could even advertise for another clerk. Perhaps Lakshmi. She has been very kind to us lately.”

“Mrs. Mudali, does that mean I’ve got the job?”

“Call me Abhirati, and yes, you have the job,” the other woman said. “Your name is Rose, right?” Rose nodded. “How soon can you start?”

“How’s five minutes ago?” Rose asked. She bit her lower lip as she grinned.

Abhirati leaned back in her chair and grinned back. “Heavenly. It sounds absolutely heavenly.” 

~oOo~

Prickles. That was his first thought. Tiny pinpricks on his fingers. It was enough to wake him from a sound sleep, but not enough to bother him. What bothered him was the pounding in his temples and more than a little queasiness. Definitely shouldn’t have had that last beer, he told himself. Or probably the two before it either.

Sleep. That’s what he needed. More sleep. He began to drift off again—and the prickles turned needle-sharp and sank deeply into his hand. 

“Ow!” John jerked his hand back and something furry rubbed against his face.

And purred.

He opened one eye. “So you came back, did you?”

The cat butted his face with her forehead again.

“I suppose you’re hungry.”

The purring grew louder and more insistent.

“Alright, I’m getting up,” he said. When he didn’t move, the cat butted him harder. “Okay, okay,” he protested. “What time is it anyway?” He looked at the clock next to the bed and swore. “I’m late!”

He jumped out of bed and got ready for work as quickly as he could, but just before he left he took the time to open one of the cans of tuna for the cat.

“Thanks for wakin’ me up,” he said as he put the open can on the floor. “I owe you one. But you’re still not movin’ in.”

~oOo~

Rose spent the rest of the morning learning the ropes of working in the office at the garage. And once she got over the pervasive odors of petrol and motor oil, the job wasn’t that bad. It was a combination of customer service and paperwork: answering the phone, scheduling appointments, filing and handling the cash register. Nothing she hadn’t done in previous jobs at one point or another. 

The one disappointment was that John wasn’t there, but she didn’t know how to ask why. No one knew she knew him—not even him—and she knew that it would be suspicious if she started asking questions about where he was. 

By lunchtime the waiting room was empty, and Abhirati decided Rose was doing well enough that she could leave for a few minutes to do a couple of errands.

“If there are any problems you can ring my mobile,” Abhirati said as she pulled her handbag out of the desk and walked to the door. “Or, better yet, get my husband.” She laughed. “With you here he hasn’t done a single thing today.” She stopped and turned back. “Are you sure you’re going to be alright here by yourself?” 

“I’ll be fine,” Rose assured her. 

Abhirati nodded and headed out, and the bell on the door jangled as it shut behind her. 

Rose picked up a pile of invoices. As she began to file them in the filing cabinet at the back of the room, behind her the bell jangled again. And before she even heard John’s voice, her skin tingled with a jolt of awareness.

“Abhirati, sorry I’m late…” His voice trailed off.

Rose slowly turned. He was staring at her, his mouth slightly open, shock written all over his face. Their eyes met.

“It’s you,” he whispered.


	8. Chapter Seven

**Chapter Seven**

_The Doctor rushed back into the TARDIS. As he crossed to the console, the door closed behind him._

_Mickey sat back on the jump seat, arms crossed, waiting for him._

_“I can’t believe you’re actually doin’ it,” he said. “You’re leavin’ Rose behind.” He shook his head in disbelief. “And you used to call me an idiot. Who’s the idiot now?”_

_The Doctor didn’t reply. Instead, with a jerk on the controls, he sent them into the Time Vortex._

While the TARDIS floated in the Vortex, the Doctor rushed around the console, pressing random buttons and flipping random switches on the control panels. It was all completely unnecessary, a centuries-old habit he had developed as a distraction technique that he used when there was something he didn’t want to deal with.

As he continued to fiddle with the controls, he could feel Mickey’s eyes on him as the younger man waited for him to say something. But he didn’t want to talk about it, didn’t even want to think about how wrong it felt leaving Rose behind for any reason. Oh, he knew it had been the only logical course of action. If the TARDIS had turned his past self human, particularly if she had done it without his knowledge or input, the crisis must have been extremely grave, much more so than he had told Rose and Mickey. And who better than to watch over his younger self than Rose, the person he trusted, the person he believed in, the person he… cared about more than anyone else.

No, there had been no other choice.

But not having her here, leaving her behind on the Estate, felt so wrong. On more levels than he wanted to admit, even to himself.

She had been gone less than five minutes and already he missed her.

“Now what we have to do is figure out where I was, what I was doing immediately before the TARDIS landed back on the Estate,” he said in a rush as he continued to circle the console. He had discovered fairly quickly after his regeneration that speaking at breakneck speed helped him focus on the task at hand, and just as fiddling with the controls did, it had the added benefit of distracting him from anything he didn’t want to think about. “And since we have no information as to what I was doing then, we’ll have to—”

“I didn’t want to come, you know,” Mickey blurted out, interrupting him.

The Doctor stopped in his tracks. He looked up at him in surprise. “What?”

“I didn’t want to come,” Mickey said again, this time more forcefully. 

“Why not?” he asked.

With that, it was as if a dam had burst within the younger man. “You aren’t half thick, you know that?” he said angrily. “After what happened on that spaceship… We almost got killed! And for what? So you could shag some French royalty, maybe get another notch on your bedpost? What is it with you? Are you shaggin’ your way through time and space? You got a list or somethin’? Who’s next? Helen of Troy? How about Madame Curie? Do you have a famous scientist on your list yet? How ‘bout an actress like Marilyn Monroe? Or a singer like Janis Joplin? Nah, you probably already did her. That’s probably how you got the coat you’re always on about.”

“That’s enough,” he said coldly, in a low, dangerous voice that had been known to stop Daleks in their tracks.

Mickey ignored him. “After all, you’ve only got so many companions. After Sarah Jane and Rose, you gotta go out for a bit of variety. Speakin’ of variety, was Captain Cheesecake on your list? You do him too?”

“That’s enough,” he warned, a little more loudly.

“Or what?” Mickey said defiantly. “You gonna take me home? Throw me out an airlock? Leave me on a spaceship filled with robots tryin’ to kill me for spare parts?”

“That’s enough!” the Doctor shouted. “I do not, as you so eloquently put it, shag my way through time and space! And I certainly do not throw people out of airlocks! The TARDIS doesn’t even have an airlock!”

“But you did leave us on that spaceship! And Rose ‘n me, we almost got killed because of it! Then, first chance you got, you did it again!”

“And first chance I got, I came back!” The Doctor took a deep breath and then continued in a calmer tone. “And I did not shag Reinette.”

Mickey glowered at him. “Whether you did or not isn’t the point. She was throwing herself at you, and you weren’t particularly dodging. You did snog her—”

“ _She_ kissed me!” the Doctor interjected.

“And you snogged her right back, and then bragged about it!”

“How do you even know about that?” the Doctor asked incredulously.

“Metal walls… the whole spaceship was like an echo chamber,” Mickey answered. “Do you even realize how bad that trip was, not just for me, but for Rose as well?” He started ticking things off on his fingers. “You snog a woman who you had just met as a child not five minutes earlier, you go and get drunk with her at a party while we almost get killed, you leave Rose…you leave _both_ of us stranded on the spaceship in order to save her without having a clue as to how you were gonna get back, _then_ you invite her along in the TARDIS, and that’s even after she treated Rose like crap. How do you think that made her feel? But Reinette was only rude to her. You… you treated her like shit. You never would have done that before.”

“Before what?” the Doctor demanded, exasperated.

“Before you changed. You may have been a complete arse to me back then, callin’ me ‘Mickey the Idiot’, always tryin’ to wind me up, but you always treated Rose well.” 

The Doctor stared at him, more than a little shocked at the accusation. “I’m the same man I was, Mickey,” he said less heatedly.

“But are you though? I don’t think so,” Mickey said. “Back then, you always took care of her. You even sent her back home once to keep her safe. But now…” 

“Is that what Rose thinks too?” the Doctor asked quietly. “That I’m not the same man I was?”

“No,” Mickey admitted. “She’s still defending you, like she always has. But you really, really hurt her. I may not have been the best boyfriend, but I never treated her like you just did. Last person who treated her like that was Jimmy. Why she stuck around with him as long as she did I’ll never understand. But as bad as he was, I think what you did was worse.”

The Doctor stared unseeing at the console in front of him. For several long moments the only sound in the console room was that of the rise and fall of the Time Rotor.

“If you didn’t want to come, Mickey,” the Doctor said eventually, “why did you?”

“For Rose,” he answered. “She’s worried about you. Doesn’t think you should travel alone.”

The Doctor laughed ruefully, a quiet, humorless sound. “She’s probably right. She usually is.”

“She cares about you, you know,” Mickey said. “And I think you care about her. Which is why none of this makes any sense.”

The Doctor looked up sharply at him. “None of what?” 

“All of this: Reinette, me travelin’ with the two of you… This may be none of my business but Rose said you two are just friends—” 

“We are,” the Doctor interjected.

“And that’s the part that makes the least sense of all,” Mickey said. “Cos you either care about her the way she cares about you or you don’t. And if you really care about her the way she cares about you, why aren’t the two of you together?”

“The part of this that makes the least sense is why I’m talking to you about any of this!” 

Mickey ignored the outburst. “She says you don’t do that sort of thing because it would hurt too much afterwards,” he continued. “But I don’t think that’s it. I don’t think you do care about her after all. I think you’re just a bloody wanker. You’re just usin’ her, the way you keep her here with you, leadin’ her on, knowin’ full well how she feels about you.”

“You make it sound like she’s locked up,” the Doctor said sharply, “like I’m holding her prisoner or something. She could leave if she wanted to.”

“But she never will and you know that! You’re just usin’ her, actin’ like you care about her one minute and then pushin’ her away the next. Either that or…” Mickey stared at him, jaw open.

“Or what?” the Doctor asked.

“Or you really do care about her and you’re just afraid to show it,” he said slowly. He shook his head in disbelief. “That’s it, isn’t it? She’s right. You do care about her, but you’re afraid to do anything about it.” His lip curled derisively. “That makes you more than just a wanker—that makes you a cowardly one as well.”

As Mickey’s words hung between them, the silence in the console room became oppressive. The Doctor’s jaw tightened: in anger, in frustration, and in guilt.

“Well, if that’s the way you feel,” the Doctor said tightly, “we’d best get on with this then so we can get you back home.” He began to work his way around the console again, this time actually programming in the next set of coordinates rather than just pretending to do so.

“So what’s the plan again?” Mickey asked after a moment.

“Well, we know that whatever happened to me happened between the time I left the two of you and then came back.” He spun a dial on one panel, then moved two panels to the left and typed in a complex code before returning to spin the dial again. “So it’s just a matter of retracing my steps to see exactly what happened. Once we know what the problem was, and what caused it, then we can figure out how to fix it.”

“Okay, so if we are retracing your steps,” Mickey said, “how are we gonna do it if you don’t remember anything? I mean, where do we start?”

“We start with what Rose said she saw when she visited Clive,” he answered. He moved to the opposite side of the console to flip three switches in rapid succession before returning to spin the dial again. “Rose said she had seen pictures of me in places where I don’t ever remember going.”

“Yeah, the Titanic, the Kennedy assassination, and then, what was it, a volcano or something?”

“Krakatoa,” the Doctor answered. “But the question is, why those three places? What’s so special about them?” He stopped his motion around the console for a moment and thoughtfully rubbed his chin. “What could possibly link them?”

“Well, they’re all on Earth,” Mickey said.

The Doctor waved a hand dismissively. “That’s not particularly significant. I had just dealt with the Nestene Consciousness so I was already here.” His voice drifted off as he frowned thoughtfully. “But why those three places?” he said to himself. “I’d think that of all places I could go, I’d avoid them, not intentionally go there.”

“Why?” Mickey asked. 

“Why what?”

“Why would you avoid them?” Mickey asked.

“Well, because they’re all fixed points,” the Doctor answered. “Most things that happen in the universe are in flux, malleable. A change in them will change the flow of history in a limited sense or a finite area but not affect the universe at large. A smaller number are branching points, much like a fork in a road. A decision to turn right rather than left can lead to the creation of an entirely new universe, parallel to the original one. But a fixed point is different. A fixed point is something that has to happen, an incident or event that influences the universe so strongly that it not happening has the potential to unravel time itself. One wrong move, one slight alteration in anything, and the consequences…” His eyes widened and his jaw dropped.

“What?” Mickey asked.

“They’re fixed points!” the Doctor said. “That _is_ the connection! For some reason I was intentionally going to events that were fixed points in time!” He rushed around the console in order to finish setting the coordinates.

“Where are we going?”

“To try and prevent me from accidentally ripping apart the cosmos!”

~oOo~

John rushed across the crowded Estate, making his way to the garage. It was noon, and there were cars and people everywhere. Lunchtime, he reminded himself. Everyone and his brother had evidently decided to go out to lunch, and in Peckham no less.

Dammit. He was so late. He didn’t ever remember being this late in his life. Admittedly, with his memories stretching back only six months that wasn’t saying much, but still.

Forced to stop at a crosswalk just across from the garage, he swore under his breath as he waited for his turn to cross. He could kick himself. Going on a bender on a Sunday night, staying up until half four in the morning when he had to be at work at eight wasn’t his brightest move. What was wrong with him? He wasn’t a teenager for God’s sake.

The light turned green. He rushed across the street and burst through the door to the office. “Abhirati, sorry I’m late…” 

His voice trailed off. The young woman behind the desk wasn’t Abhirati Mudali. She was easily three inches taller and much thinner than the pregnant office manager, not to mention she had blonde hair, not black.

_Blonde hair. A hand in his. “Run!”_

She turned slowly to face him and their eyes met.

_Blonde hair. Warm brown eyes. A generous mouth._

_A hand in his._

_“Run!”_

“It’s you,” he whispered.

And it was. It was the girl he had been dreaming about. And what’s more, he saw recognition in her eyes.

She knew him.

_She knew him._

She bit her lip and gave him a quick, shy smile. “Hello,” she said.

“Hello.” Part of him hoped he knew her well, but another part was afraid that if he asked about it he’d look like an idiot if he was a relative or something. But he had no choice. Besides, it wouldn’t be the first time he looked like an idiot. Possibly not even the first time today. “I’m sorry. You look so familiar,” he said. “I… know you, right?”

She didn’t seem surprised at the question. “Yeah,” she answered. “Well, sort of.”

“Sort of?”

She hesitated before answering. “We, uh, met a couple of years ago. When Henrik’s blew up. I was working there then, and we were both… across the street when it happened.”

His forehead wrinkled as he looked inward, trying to recall anything about their meeting. 

_A hand in his. “Run.”_

There was something more, he knew it, it was just on the edge of his awareness, but every time he tried to grasp it, it flitted away. Finally he shook his head in defeat. “Sorry.”

“‘S alright,” she said. “We only met just the once.”

That didn’t sound right. Why would he have been dreaming about her so often if they had only met once, and casually at that? 

On the other hand, why would she lie?

"What's Henrik's?" he asked.

"A department store. It's up on the high street," she told him. "Well, it was on the high street. It isn't there anymore."

"I suppose not, not if it blew up," he said. 

She laughed.

“So… what are you doing here?” he asked curiously.

She grinned at him. “I work here.”

“Since when?”

“Since this morning,” she replied. Her grin widened and he saw the tip of her tongue peek out the side of her mouth and touch her upper teeth. He wasn’t sure he had ever seen anyone smile that way before. Certainly no one had ever smiled that way at him before. He found it slightly distracting.

“You’d know that if you had gotten here on time,” she continued. “See what you miss when you’re late?”

He blinked at the teasing, and then he grinned. “I’ll have to make sure I’m on time from now on.”

“You do that,” she replied.

The door leading into the garage burst open and the shop owner barreled in. “Abhirati, did Manchester ever—oh, I see you finally decided to show up.”

“Sorry about that…” John started.

“Well, see that it doesn’t happen again, or you’ll find yourself out the door and on the dole,” Mudali snapped.

“Empty threat, Mudali, and we both know it,” John replied.

Mudali continued as if John hadn’t spoken. “Now there’s an Infiniti out there and no one can figure out what’s wrong with it. I suggest you get your sorry arse out there and get started on it instead of staying in here and chatting up our new receptionist.”

“I wasn’t…” Out of the corner of his eye, John could see that the girl was biting her lip again, but this time in order to hide a grin. Oh. Maybe he had been.

Mudali headed back out into the garage, and John reluctantly followed him out. As his boss began to point out the car, John held up one finger.

“Just a second,” he said. 

He turned and stuck his head back in the office. The girl was still standing in the same place, watching him, a small smile on her face. “By the way, my name’s John. What’s yours?”

The small smile turned into a bright grin. “My name’s Rose,” she said. “Rose Tyler.”

“Nice to meet you, Rose,” he said.

She stifled a giggle, and murmured something under her breath. 

He stared at her, puzzled. “I beg your pardon?”

She shook her head. “Sorry. Don’t mind me. Just… a private joke.”

He nodded slowly and headed back into the garage. He must have misheard her, he thought. Because it almost sounded like she had said, _“Run for your life.”_


	9. Chapter Eight

**Chapter Eight**

Heart pounding, Rose watched as the Doctor—no, _John_ , she reminded herself—went back into the garage to get to work. Once she was sure he was gone she began to giggle giddily. When one of the customers in the waiting area looked at her curiously, she quickly slapped her hands over her mouth for a moment to stifle the sound. 

It was him. He might not be himself, he might think he was someone else, but it was him.

And somehow, despite whatever had happened to him, on some level he still remembered her.

All of a sudden her knees felt weak, and she sank down onto the chair behind the reception desk. She looked down at her hands. Despite her best efforts to hold them still, they were quivering.

“Look at me. I’m literally shaking,” she said aloud. “The Doctor’d probably say it’s a reaction to adrenalin or something.” She took a deep breath and let it out slowly in order to compose herself.

Before she’d gotten to the shop, she’d had a vague idea about telling him she didn’t remember him, but the instant she had seen him looking at her she knew that that’d never work. She’d never be able hide the fact that they knew each other. Despite having been able to con her mother into believing all sorts of things growing up, she’d never fooled him, not for one instant, not about anything. She just wasn’t that good an actress.

After seeing him up close, she could see why her mother didn’t immediately recognize him, particularly if he hadn’t shaved when she had seen him. He had at least a couple day’s growth on his face, obscuring the mole on his cheek, not to mention the fact that he clearly hadn’t had a haircut in months. It was easily several inches long. Between the hair and the almost-beard, both his nose and his ears looked less prominent. If you add that to the fact that he was wearing a short sleeved denim work shirt rather than a jumper and a leather jacket, he looked like someone else entirely. 

But she would have known him anywhere. The shape of his shoulders. The steely blue of his eyes. And that grin. The grin that had always made her heart race.

And his voice. The light tenor, the Northern accent. Mr. Mudali called him “Manchester”, evidently because of it. She snickered at the thought. If he only knew how far off he was.

_“If you are an alien, then how come you sound like you’re from the North?”_

_“Lots of planets have a North!”_

She leaned across the desk to peek through the door. She could just see him on the far side of the garage. He had his head under the bonnet of the Infiniti. Despite how incongruous it was to see him working on a car, the sight was still incredibly familiar. How many times had she seen him just like that, working on the TARDIS?

As if he knew she was looking at him, he turned his head in her direction. She quickly sat back out of his line of sight. School, she thought in amusement. It was just like being back in school. How often had she been almost caught staring at boys in class?

She needed to focus on something else, she reminded herself. She wasn’t supposed to be here flirting with him. She was here to make sure he didn’t get into trouble. She had a job to do.

A job! All of a sudden she remembered just where she was. She had a job now, a job she needed to keep if she was going to get close enough to him to watch him, and she was supposed to be working.

Over the next hour she tried her best to concentrate on the work at hand—on filing, on printing up invoices, on answering the phone—but her mind kept on returning to their conversation. Had she told him too much? Flirted too much? Not that she could have stopped herself if she had tried.

Periodically she’d peek into the garage again. She couldn’t stop herself, even though there was a risk of getting caught. It was so odd to see him like this, the way he looked before he had changed but so different at the same time. 

And knowing him so much better than him knowing her. Assuming the Doctor didn’t get back right away, if she got to know him now, how on Earth would she manage not to let anything slip about his future? After all, she hadn’t even been able to hide that they’d met, had even blurted out that they’d met the night Henrik’s had blown up.

Maybe her mum wasn’t as much a risk of giving out too much information as she was.

A tiny voice whispered inside her head that it was more than that, that it was more than the fact that he looked like the first him she’d known. She knew his brown haired, brown eyed, pinstriped self was the same man, she knew it down into her bones, but part of her had missed this him, big ears, blue eyes, Northern accent and all. She had told herself that things had changed between her and the Doctor after they had met Sarah Jane, and particularly after Reinette, but really it had begun before that. Things had been a little off between them ever since his regeneration. It was like they had had to learn how to be around each other all over again, and she missed the easy relationship they’d had before he’d regenerated.

She felt guilty feeling that way, even a little tiny bit, and she shoved the thought away from herself.

Finally about an hour later the front door jingled and Abhirati burst back in.

“Rose, I’m so sorry it took so long for me to get back!” she apologized. “How did everything go while I was gone?”

“Fine,” she answered.

“Then why don’t you go for the day,” the older woman said. “After all, you didn’t even get a lunch.”

Rose glanced at the door leading to the garage. She’d hoped to see the Doctor—no, _John_ , she reminded herself again—again that day. 

“But…” she protested. “Don’t you still need me? I can stay as long as you want.”

“No, that’s fine,” Abhirati replied. “You’ve already been a huge help today. Anything not done today can wait until tomorrow.”

Rose wanted to protest again but knew it would look suspicious. Instead, she thanked her new boss and left. 

“Now what?” she said once she was outside. It would be hours before the Doctor— _John_ , she reminded herself irritably for the third time—got off work. Maybe she could hang out somewhere for a while and _accidentally_ run into him after he got off work. 

She looked up and down the street. There were a number of fast food restaurants and cafés with a clear view of the garage, and some of them wouldn’t blink at her staying there for hours during the afternoon. Particularly the Chinese place directly across from it. 

Perfect.

Rose headed across the street but stopped before she entered the restaurant. She reached for her wallet—and groaned. She didn’t have it. No wallet, no money. She had only occasionally needed money since she had begun traveling with the Doctor, and what little she had left from her last job was in her room in the TARDIS. She had been traveling in the TARDIS so long she had forgotten to bring it.

Disappointed, she headed back to her mum’s flat.

Her mother was in the lounge in her typical afternoon spot, on the sofa in front of the television. Some sort of talk show was on telly, and she was on the phone. Rose unsuccessfully tried to slip unnoticed into the kitchen to get something to eat. She winced when her mother waved at her to stop.

“I’ll have to ring you back, Bev. Rose is here,” Jackie said. She rang off and put the phone on the table before getting up to give her daughter a hug. “Hello, sweetheart. I was sure you’d all be off by now.” She looked over Rose’s shoulder. “So where’s himself, then?”

“Back at the TARDIS.” 

Jackie’s eyes narrowed. “Alright, what’s goin’ on between you two?”

“What do you mean?”

“I hardly ever see one of you without the other. The two of you are usually like Siamese twins, you are. But now you’ve been here two days and he hasn’t been here at all. So what’s up?”

“Can’t I just want to spend some time alone with my mum?”

Jackie crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow. “As much as I’d love to believe that was true, I don’t buy it for a minute. So where is he?”

“In the TARDIS.”

“And where’s the TARDIS?”

Rose hesitated a moment. “It’s complicated.” With a sigh of inevitability, she gestured at the sofa. “You’d better sit down. This might take a while.”

~oOo~

An hour and a fresh pot of tea later, Jackie was still puzzled.

It had taken a while for Rose to explain to her the intricacies of time travel: how the same person could accidentally be in the same place and time twice over. She had had that conversation with her mum before, in regards to being at her father’s death both as a baby and as an adult, but the implications evidently hadn’t sunk in because her mother was still confused.

“So the bloke that was here fixin’ my tap was really the Doctor?” Jackie asked.

“Yes, Mum,” Rose replied.

“Before he regenerated? Even though he regenerated six months ago?”

“Yes, Mum,” Rose said again. “Before I even began traveling with him in fact.”

“And he thinks he’s human?”

“No. He is human. Really, properly human.”

“Because of that cammy thing.”

“Chameleon arch,” Rose corrected. “It turned him human.”

“And he thinks his name’s John Smith?”

“Yeah.”

“And he’s workin’ as a mechanic down at Mickey’s old job?”

“Yep.”

“And he doesn’t remember anythin’ about bein’ the Doctor or bein’ an alien or that blue box of his?”

“The TARDIS,” Rose said. “Not ‘that blue box’, and he doesn’t appear to.”

Jackie shook her head slowly. “And he’s the same person who fixed my tap?” She had a strange expression on her face, one that looked to be a combination of distaste, embarrassment, and dread.

“Yeah, Mum. Why?”

“No reason,” she replied quickly. “No reason ‘t all.”

Rose rolled her eyes. That had been the third time her mum had asked about the Doctor—no, _John_ —fixing her tap, and each time she had looked more and more uncomfortable. “Alright, what happened?” 

“Nothing.”

Rose gave her a look. 

“Nothing,” Jackie insisted. “Honest!”

Rose sighed. Her mother had always been a terrible liar. If she said nothing happened, that meant something had definitely happened, something she didn’t want to admit to, and Rose was fairly certain she didn’t want to know what it was.

“The important thing is that if you see him, you don’t say anything to him about any of this,” Rose warned. “As the Doctor, he hasn’t even met you yet.”

“I know, I know,” her mum replied.

“In fact, it might be best if you just avoid him entirely,” Rose said.

Jackie’s eyes lit up. “Yes!” she said quickly. “Yes, that’s exactly what I’ll do! I’ll avoid him. ‘S not like I’d want to go out of my way to spend time with him anyway, the bloody wanker.” She nodded decisively. “I’ll just avoid him.”

After giving her mother another sharp look, Rose shook her head, trying not to think about what had happened between John and her mum. She really, really did not want to know.

“So if you’re here watchin’ over this him while the other one is off with Mickey figurin’ out what happened, how long are you gonna be here?”

“I don’t know,” Rose answered. “It could take a while.”

“Well, as much as I love havin’ you here, sweetheart, I can’t be supportin’ you,” Jackie told her. “If you’re here more than a week or so, you’re gonna have to get a job. Henrik’s is hirin’.”

“Henrik’s rebuilt?” Rose asked in astonishment. “When did that happen?”

“They’ve been workin’ on it a while now. In fact, their grand re-opening is in a couple of weeks. Of course, you’d know that if you were around more,” Jackie said pointedly. “Anyway, since you used to work there, you could probably get your old job back. It's the least they could do considering you could have been killed when it blew up."

Rose didn’t answer for a moment as she was still trying to wrap her head around the fact that Henrik’s had rebuilt and she hadn’t known about it.

“Rose. Rose!”

“No,” she finally replied after she realized her mother was trying to get her attention. “I’ve already got a job. I’m working at the garage. I started this morning.”

Jackie looked both surprised and pleased.

“Good,” she said decisively. “That store was givin’ you airs and graces anyway. If you’d just taken the job at the butcher’s in the first place you’d probably never have run off with him.”

Rose didn’t bother to answer as her mother was right, but not for the reason she thought. If she hadn’t worked at Henrik’s, she’d never have met the Doctor. And instead of traveling through time and space with him, she’d have been stuck here on the Estate, possibly for the rest of her life. 

And then she remembered Sarah Jane, who had waited almost her entire life for him to return. It could still happen. She could still be stuck here, living out the rest of her life on the Estate, her days filled with jobs and telly and beans on toast.

Inwardly she shuddered. 

~oOo~

John set the remnants of his tea on the table and sat down at the computer. The little black cat, who was definitely not moving in, immediately jumped up into his lap. 

When he had finished the repairs on the Infiniti, John had brought the paperwork on the car into the office only to find that Rose had left for the day. He’d had to work hard to hide his disappointment. He’d hoped to be able to talk to her again. He refused to consider that part of the reason he was so disappointed had nothing to do with the fact she might hold a key to his past. 

But even in the short conversation he’d had with her, he’d gotten more information from her about his past than he’d been able to learn in the past six months. She’d told him a specific time and place he’d been in the time he couldn’t remember. Outside Henrik’s Department Store the night it had blown up. 

He studied the article on the monitor in front of him. Henrik’s had exploded early in 2005. Several terrorist groups had rushed to take credit, but the final conclusion was that the explosion had been as a result of a gas leak. There appeared to be only one fatality, an electrician named Wilson, something that was being heralded as a miracle since only a short while earlier the store had been filled with both shoppers and staff. Neither he nor Rose had been mentioned.

One interesting fact he had learned was that Rose had been wrong about one thing. Henrik’s had been rebuilt. A simple search revealed that in fact their grand opening was in only a few weeks. For a moment he wondered why she didn’t know, since it appeared to be big news locally.

He spent the next hour reading as many newspaper articles and official reports as he could on the night of the explosion, but they gave him no more information than he already had. He had, however, learned one thing, one very important, thing he hadn’t known before. One crucial piece of the puzzle that was his past.

He had been in London in 2005. Almost two full years before he had woken up in the alley on New Year’s. 

It was a new place to concentrate his search for clues to his past. If he had been here, and according to Rose he had, there must be some evidence. Somewhere.

But before he began to search for himself again, he had something, or _someone_ , else to research. His fingers flew across the keyboard, searching for a current resident of Peckham named Rose Tyler.

There were three: a twelve year old schoolgirl, a thirty-six year old married mother of three, and a sixty-nine year old Roman Catholic nun. Damn. This was clearly not going to be as easy as he had expected it would.

“Rose Tyler, who are you?” he said aloud, waking the cat enough that she began to purr. He absently petted her before returning to the computer.

To his surprise, there were thousands of Rose Tylers in the UK, twice as many if you counted variations of the name like Rosalyn or Rosemary. He immediately refined the search to exclude those as well as the ones from Scotland, Ireland, and Wales. 

Down to 1145.

She looked to be about twenty, give or take a year, so he excluded all who were eighteen and younger or over twenty-five. 

Down to 452.

Her accent was London, so he narrowed the search to the Greater London area.

135.

South London.

27.

A manageable number, but how to narrow it further? What else did he know about her? His brow furrowed in concentration.

South London accent, about twenty… 

He suddenly remembered she had said she had worked at Henrik’s.

“Yes!” he said, waking the cat again. After giving him a nip, she jumped down and stalked off. He hardly noticed as he began to hack into the employment records of the store. 

“There you are. Rose Marion Tyler,” he said slowly, listening to the way it sounded as it rolled off his tongue. “Based on this, currently twenty years old, 48 Bucknall House, Peckham.” He glanced over at the window. “Huh, that’s just across the courtyard. Employee ID number…”

There was scarcely any more information than that in Henrik’s records, basically just her dates of employment and sorely inadequate pay, so he moved on to a Google search of her full name.

There were only two Rose Marion Tylers in the country. One was a sixty year old woman—in Manchester of all places, he thought in amusement given his nickname—whose son Sam had been a DCI in the Greater Manchester Police until an auto accident had put him in a coma the previous year.

The other was the one he was looking for.

Rose Marion Tyler. Daughter of Jacqueline Tyler, resident of Peckham, and Peter Tyler, deceased. Attended Jericho Street Junior School. Won the bronze in a gymnastics competition for under-7s. Left school aged sixteen with adequate scores on her GCSEs. More than adequate, actually, and he wondered why she hadn't sat for A-levels. Worked various jobs until she was hired by Henrik’s Department Store, where she worked as a shop assistant.

Disappeared the day after Henrik’s blew up.

John stared at the screen. “Well, she’s certainly not missing now,” he said aloud.

Another search revealed a series of stories on her disappearance in the local paper.

_Local Girl Missing After Explosion_

_Shop Assistant Goes Missing Day After Explosion_

_Mother Distraught Over Missing Daughter_

_Local Man Questioned Over Disappearance of Girlfriend_

He skimmed the articles. They were filled with speculation as to what may have happened to her, but they contained few actual facts, only a brief biography and the date of her disappearance.

Finally he found a single, very short article dated approximately a year later.

_Missing Girl Turns Up With Older Man—Says She Was “Traveling”_

_After being missing a year, local girl Rose Tyler finally turned up at her mother’s home in Peckham in the company of a man believed to be in his late thirties or early forties. The police have refused to comment officially, although unnamed sources in the department have said that the man stated he had hired Tyler as a companion. Although the two denied a sexual relationship, the police are reportedly skeptical of the claim. The case is now considered closed._

John chuckled. “Now that’s a story I’d like to hear,” he said.


	10. Chapter Nine

**Chapter Nine**

Heart pounding, John automatically reached for his sketchbook and pencils in an attempt to try to capture the dream images before they faded.

Fire, searing fire. Flames burning the trees, the fields, even the air itself. More disjointed faces and bizarre pepperpot creatures. A blue box floating in a sky of planets and stars. A cavernous chamber with metal grating on the floor and odd columns that branched treelike as they stretched to the ceiling.

And the blonde girl.

No, not the blonde girl. _Rose_. Rose Tyler.

His pencil flew across the pad as he sketched Rose. Standing on the embankment of the Thames. Running hand in hand with him. Swinging on a chain over an enormous pit.

Clearly many of the dream images were simply products of his subconscious. Knowing that he had been present at the explosion of Henrik's however could explain his recurring dreams of fire. Maybe some of the other images were memories trying to come to the surface, particularly the ones of Rose.

_A hand in his. Run._

Or perhaps the dreams of Rose were just products of fantasy, of wishful thinking, he thought, as he looked as his sketch of Rose in his arms after he had caught her midair.

He pushed the thought out his mind. Thoughts of holding Rose were completely inappropriate given their obvious and fairly substantial age difference.

Not to mention they were pointless.

When they'd met and she'd begun teasing him, he was instantly smitten, but even if they'd been the same age, there was no way she'd ever be attracted to him. Not with his daft face. Allowing himself to develop a crush on her was a bad idea. Nothing could come of it, and it would be nothing but trouble since he was working with her.

He pulled a face. Work. Damn, he had to get ready for work. He didn't want to be late again. He didn't mind his job, he really didn't—after all it beat sitting around his flat all day with nothing to do—but working, actually having a job that he went to, always seemed to him like a foreign, even alien, concept.

But today he'd see Rose again. And that was fantastic.

And as he headed to the shower a slow grin spread across his face.

~oOo~

Rose was jerked awake by the harsh sound of the alarm clock. Gritting her teeth, she slammed her hand down on it.

Blessed silence. She sighed in relief.

After a moment she propped herself up onto her elbows and looked at the clock. Half seven. Barely enough time to get ready and get to work by eight.

"Time to get up, sweetheart," her mother called from the hall. "You've got a job to get to, and believe me, I never thought I'd say that again."

Rose rolled her eyes.

"And you'd better get in and out of the bathroom quick, because Stuart's gotta get in there too," Jackie added.

Rose dropped her head back on the pillow and groaned.

~oOo~

Twenty minutes later, she flew down the stairs leading to the courtyard. Despite hurrying through shower, hair, and makeup, she was running late. Not good for only her second day at work. She needed to reset her alarm clock for seven.

She just wasn't used to having to get ready at a certain time anymore. The Doctor would tease her about taking forever to get ready in the morning—or what served as morning on the TARDIS—but truly, they were never late places because of her.

She had gotten spoiled.

She burst out the door to the courtyard—and stopped. _He_ was coming out of the building across the way.

Perfect. She grinned.

He headed towards the alley, and she called out to him. "Doc—" She stopped herself and winced. Dammit. She had to watch that.

"John," she yelled.

He stopped and turned towards the sound of her voice. She jogged to catch up with him, and they automatically fell into step.

"Running late again?" she asked.

"Evidently I'm not the only one," he said, sounding amused.

She ignored that. "I figure that as long as we're headed to the same place, we could walk together," she said.

"Works for me."

~oOo~

Over the next several days John fell into the habit of walking to and from work with Rose, ostensibly because they lived in the same area, but actually just because John enjoyed her company. He watched for her, and if she was running late he waited just inside the entrance to his building until he could see her coming down the stairs of Bucknall House. That way he could _accidentally_ run into her in the courtyard. In the afternoon since he usually got done earlier than she did, he'd waste time slowly cleaning up the garage until she got off, and then like a schoolboy who fancied a girl, he'd walk her home. It meant he'd have to run out again to pick up something for tea, but it was worth it.

And the only time one of the other mechanics had begun to make a crude comment on their arrival together, a single look from John had stopped him mid-sentence. After that, no one had dared to say anything.

That Saturday, John left his flat a few minutes early in order to take a side trip to the floor below his before meeting Rose. A row between Rita and Chuck had woken him up again in the middle of the night. Since it had ended quickly, he hadn't bothered getting up to stop it. Although all was quiet now, he just wanted to make sure Rita was okay.

He lightly rapped on the door to their flat and waited a minute. He thought about knocking again but then decided against it, not wanting to disturb her if she was asleep. Just as he was turning to leave, the door opened a crack. Through the narrow opening he could see the chain lock fastened and a single eye peering at him.

"Rita, are you alright?" he asked quietly.

She shushed him and nodded.

"Did he hurt you?"

"No," she whispered. "I'm fine. But Chuck's asleep and I don't want him to wake up."

Rita started to close the door, and John stopped her. He searched her face, what he could see of it, and frowned. "You sure you're alright?"

"Yes," she hissed. "Now go on, before he wakes up."

"I'm comin' back here after work to check on you," he told her.

"Fine," she said with a huff and shut the door in his face.

Still frowning, he headed down to the courtyard to meet Rose.

~oOo~

For the first time in weeks, the afternoon was slow. With nothing to do, the other mechanics had gone home at lunchtime. Even the boss and his wife had taken a rare afternoon off, leaving Rose to work the desk and John to finish up the repairs on the last few cars.

John snuck a look over the engine he was working on into the garage's office. Rose was sitting at the desk doing some sort of paperwork. Even he could see from where he was that she was bored to tears.

She didn't belong here, he thought. She was too bright, too curious about the world around her to be spending her days filing and answering the telephone. Of course everyone had to make a living of some sort, that was the reason he worked here as well, but she seemed destined for greater things than working in the office of a mechanic's shop.

He watched her for a minute. She looked a little different today. Her shoulder length blonde hair was sort of wavy, and she was wearing a bright pink top that suited her coloring.

She sure was pretty.

No. He shouldn't be thinking about her that way. He was far too old for her, he told himself firmly, and returned his attention to the engine in front of him.

After he finished the car, John grabbed a spare rag to wipe his grimy hands and then tossed the cloth into a nearby barrel. He crossed to the office and stuck his head in the door.

"Finished the Ford," he said. "Just had a few loose wires and needed a new battery. Movin' on to the Vauxhall next. That'll take some time. Don't know what's wrong with that one."

"You mean you can't tell by smellin' it?" Rose asked teasingly. She gave him her wide, cheeky grin, the one with the tip of her tongue touching just the edge of her upper teeth. She often grinned at him that way, and every time she did he wanted to snog that look off her face.

Down, boy. She probably flirted with everyone like that. Although he'd never noticed her doing that. And he noticed everything about her.

"No, I can't tell by smellin' it," he answered in the same tone as she had used. "Not unless there's somethin' wrong with the fuel injection system. So the Vauxhall's problems have to be somewhere else."

"Bill and Pat both have looked at it already, and neither of them could find what was wrong," she told him.

"Bill and Pat aren't me."

She snorted. "You think you're so impressive."

"I am so impressive!" he said with false indignation.

"Then let's see how fast you can fix the next one, Mr. Impressive." She winked at him.

She _winked_ at him. His heart sped up, and unexpectedly, something stirred a bit lower. He forced himself to ignore the reaction.

"Alright," he said with a nod. "Time me."

She pulled out her mobile and made a few adjustments. "Ready, steady… go!"

Flashing her a manic grin, he rushed to the car and opened the bonnet, determined to show her just impressive he was in this. Then he could show her how impressive he was in other things.

No, he couldn't be thinking that way. Down, boy.

For the next hour or so—he felt like he should be able to instantly know how much time had passed to the second but wasn't sure why—he concentrated on the car in front of him. It was an older vehicle, not computerized, therefore whatever was wrong with it should be fairly straightforward. But the problem eluded him for some reason. Everything looked fine. It just wouldn't start. Wouldn't fire up, no matter what he did. He checked the fuel line, the battery, the fuses… everything he could think of. Well, whatever it is wasn't a simple problem.

As he began to check everything again, starting with the fuel injection system, he barely noticed a young man pull up, get out of his car, and go into the office.

After a couple of minutes, he began to hear raised voices coming from the room.

"Get outa here, Jimmy! I'm warnin' you!"

"I got every right to be 'ere. My car needs to be fixed. What would your boss say if he knew you were turnin' down business?"

"There's lots a places you can get your car fixed! Find one of them!"

Rose was yelling, but there was a tiny note of something that sounded like fear in it. John immediately dropped his wrench, not noticing or caring where it landed, and quickly strode to the office.

He stopped at the doorway and took in the scene in front of him in an instant. The younger man had his back to him and had Rose cornered in the far side of the office, blocking her way both through exit out the front door and the one into the garage.

And Rose, his fearless Rose, looked afraid. And the look on her face wiped out any realization that in his thoughts he had called her his.

"But this is the best place to get the work done," Jimmy was saying, looking her up and down. "In fact, this looks like the best place to get a lot of things… done."

"Oi! Leave her alone."

At the sound of John's voice, the younger man whirled around. Wearing jeans and a t-shirt advertising a rock band John had never heard of, Jimmy appeared to be a few years older than Rose, mid-twenties maybe, with shaggy, dark blonde hair and green eyes. He had a bit of scruff, like he hadn't shaved in a couple of days, and he reeked of cigarettes and cheap whiskey. Very cheap whiskey.

"This doesn't concern you, old man," Jimmy told him. "So fuck off."

"The lady told you to leave," John said evenly. "So it's time to leave."

Jimmy made a rude noise. "She ain't no lady. And who are you, her grandfather? Or are you her mum's latest shack-up?"

"I'm the one who's gonna kick your arse if you don't leave her alone," John said coldly.

"John, s'alright, I can handle him," Rose said.

Jimmy's mouth twisted into a nasty grin. "Yeah, I remember how well you _handled_ me," he said, his voice thick with innuendo.

"Jimmy, shut up and jus' go," Rose said. She pushed at his shoulder in emphasis.

"Don't push me, bitch," he yelled and shoved her back, hard. She slammed into the wall behind her.

And then he was on the floor, clutching his abdomen and moaning in pain with John standing over him, his foot on the back of his neck.

"If you ever touch her again," John said coldly, "if you ever see her again, if she ever sees you again, hell, if _I_ ever see you again, you will not live to regret it. Understand?"

Still on the floor, Jimmy nodded.

"So now," John continued, in an almost cheerful tone, "get yourself up, dust yourself off, and crawl back into whatever hellhole you climbed out of in the first place." He started removing his foot, and then replaced it. "Better yet, perhaps you should consider emigration. Maybe to Afghanistan. Lovely there this time of year."

Now he really did remove his foot, and Jimmy immediately scooted out the front entrance. He watched as the younger man limped over to his car and drove off.

"Good riddance to bad rubbish," he said, turning back to Rose. She was staring at him, her jaw slack.

"I didn't know you could do that," she said, her voice colored with shock—and could it possibly be admiration?

"No reason you should," he told her.

"What was that?" she asked, gesturing with her hand in the general direction of where Jimmy had been.

"A martial art that's an offshoot of Aikido," he answered without thinking. Then he frowned. How did he know that? And what's more, how did he know how to do that? It wasn't the first time he had uncovered unknown advanced skills, like his abilities on the computer or his affinity for languages, but whenever it happened it still surprised and puzzled him.

"Well, whatever it was," she said, "that was pretty—" She bit off the last word, so he supplied it.

"Impressive?" He gave her a smug grin.

She laughed. "Impressive," she agreed. She bit her upper lip for a moment before continuing. "Thank you."

"You're welcome." His grin turned into a genuine smile.

They stood there grinning at one another for several long moments, not saying anything.

"You know, I could've handled him myself," she said eventually.

"Oh, I've no doubt," he told her. "Just wanted to save you the bother. Didn't want you to ruin your manicure." The clock on the wall caught his eye, and he frowned again. Again he was struck with the idea he should have already known what time it was, should always know to the millisecond exactly what time it was.

But that was ridiculous.

"Y'know," he said slowly, tearing his eyes away from the clock, "I think it's late enough that we could probably just close up for the day."

"Sounds good to me," she agreed.

"And then maybe we could go out…" She blinked at him, she literally did, obviously surprised by his suggestion, and he didn't know how he felt about that. Would she be that shocked by him asking her out? "And you could tell me exactly who that was and why he was harassing you."

Her face fell slightly; he could see the exact instant she realized he wasn't suggesting an actual date. Did that mean she had wanted him to ask her out?

She couldn't.

Could she?

Nah. Must be just his imagination. _Or more wishful thinking_ said a small voice inside his head. A voice that was gonna get him into trouble, he told himself.

She had quickly substituted the look of disappointment for a bright smile. "Closing early sounds great," she said. "Goin' out too. Anything to get away from this mess." She gestured at all the papers she had been working on earlier. "Besides, I figure I owe you. For savin' my manicure 'n all. I'll even pay." Then she frowned. "I forgot. I won't have any money until I get paid next week."

"'S alright," he said. "I'll pay."

"You'll pay?" She was staring at him again, a look of shock on her face, and he wondered why.

"I'll pay," he told her. "You can pay next time."

She gave him a wide grin, and he realized he had just suggested they go out more than once.

"Fantastic!" she said.


	11. Chapter Ten

**Chapter Ten**

As he adjusted his dark grey silk tie, Mickey examined himself in the full length mirror in the corner of the wardrobe. 

He had never been one for suits. He did own one, which he usually only wore to weddings, but the last time he had worn it had been to his grandmother’s funeral several years earlier. Afterwards he had shoved it in the back of his cupboard, intending never to wear it again.

But this suit was as different from that one as a Rolls Royce was from a Mini Cooper. He had found it hanging in the front of the wardrobe with a spotlight shining on it. It was made of fine grey wool lined with satin, the cut of the jacket and trousers were in a timeless style, the cotton shirt was crisp and pure white, and the tie was neither too narrow nor too wide. 

And the Doctor had told him that although jeans and t-shirts were becoming common in the era, in order to be close to the route the presidential motorcade would take they needed to be dressed conservatively enough that they wouldn’t stand out in the crowd lining the streets, and Mickey needed to change.

He had slipped the clothes on and discovered that not only was everything his size, it all fit him like a glove. After admiring himself in the mirror once more, he placed a felt fedora on his head and adjusted it to a jaunty angle. 

Mickey grinned. “I should definitely wear a suit more often, because I look good,” he said aloud.

Several minutes later, minus the hat, Mickey returned to the console room to find the Doctor standing at the console, staring into the monitor and frowning.

“Is this alright?” he asked.

The Doctor barely spared him a glance. “It’s fine.” 

“Because there was a hat there too. I can go back and get it…” 

The Doctor didn’t answer. Instead he began to flip a switch back and forth over and over again so hard he looked like he was going to break it.

“What’s wrong?” Mickey asked.

“The TARDIS doesn’t want to land,” he answered. “I’m going to have to force her to. Hang on!”

The mere fact that the Doctor was warning him of a rough landing, when he had never given him a warning before, made Mickey grab onto the nearest coral strut and hang on for dear life. The Doctor rushed around the console, flipping switches, pressing buttons and spinning dials. Finally he yanked on a large lever. The TARDIS evidently wasn’t responding the way the Doctor wanted it to, because he grabbed a mallet hanging off the edge of the console and began hitting the controls.

With that, the TARDIS console room rocked violently back and forth and began to echo with the sounds of materialization. Despite hanging on, Mickey was thrown to the floor.

“Ow,” he complained. Wincing, he stood and rubbed his bum.

The Doctor ignored the complaint as he stared into the monitor again. “I’m already here,” he said.

“Well, that’s why we came, yeah? Because he’s here?”

“Yes, but I was hoping to arrive before he did. If we had arrived first, we’d have been able to track him from the moment he left his TARDIS.” 

Mickey yanked on his collar in a futile attempt to make it more comfortable. Although the suit fit perfectly, he’d never get used to wearing a tie. “Didn’t you say you could sense him?” he asked. “In your head or somethin’?”

“If I can sense him, he can sense me, and that’s the last thing we want.” The Doctor let out a huff of irritation. “Now we’ll have to do this the hard way. We’ll just have to look for him.” He picked up his long brown overcoat and pulled it on. Mickey frowned.

“Aren’t you gonna change?” he asked.

“Why bother? Pinstriped suit? It’s a classic,” the Doctor informed him. “Wearing this I fit in anywhere. Well, almost anywhere. I did have to change into a toga while we were in ancient Rome. And then there’s this little planet named Xerbet in the galaxy Andromeda where all forms of clothing are absolutely forbidden. Against the law, in fact. See, the Xerbetians value honesty above all other virtues, and they see clothing as a form of deception. They consider the hiding of one’s body to be the hiding of one’s true self. Quite liberating, actually, albeit a bit chilly.”

“You didn’t take Rose there, did you?” Mickey asked.

The Doctor didn’t answer, but a smirk spread across his face. He headed towards the TARDIS exit and Mickey quickly followed.

“Seriously, you didn’t take Rose there? You’re just windin’ me up again, yeah?”

Ignoring the question, the Doctor flung open the doors of the TARDIS. “Mickey Smith, welcome to Dallas, Texas, 22 November, 1963.” 

The TARDIS had landed in a narrow alley between two tall brick buildings. Thankfully, it was deserted. Because of his own experiences having seen it appear and disappear and even plummet from the sky, Mickey didn’t know how strangers would react to what looked like a British police box suddenly appearing, seemingly out of nowhere, on a city street in America, but he assumed it wouldn’t be good.

“Looks a bit boring,” he answered, looking up at the metal fire escapes that clung to the walls of the building. “Could be any alley anywhere. You sure we’re in Dallas?”

The Doctor gave him a look before heading out of the alley. 

Mickey followed him out to the street and his jaw dropped. He stared around himself in amazement. The storefronts looked like many of the older stores on the Estate, with old fashioned cafés replacing modern takeaways, but the street...

The street was filled with Packards and Plymouths, Buicks and Chevys, some of which he had only seen in photographs before. All were ancient vehicles to him, but they weren’t ancient here. They were new, brand new in some cases. 

And the people also seemed to come from another era. Which they did, he reminded himself. The women all wore dresses that fell below the knee, and the men all either wore suits or trousers paired with collared shirts or jumpers. Mickey suddenly understood why the Doctor had insisted he change out of his t-shirt and jeans. He would have stuck out like a sore thumb.

“Unreal,” he said. “Looks like a movie set. But it’s real. It’s really, actually real. We’re really in the past.” He grinned. “Now that’s what I’m talkin’ about! And Dallas, 1963! History in the makin’!” he said excitedly. A couple of passersby stared at him, and he lowered his voice. “The grassy knoll, the second gunman…”

“Ah, so you’re a conspiracy buff?” the Doctor asked.

“A little,” he answered. “So, what was it? Did Lee Harvey Oswald act alone or was there a second gunman? Was he hired by the KGB or in league with the Mafia? Did the CIA order the hit?”

The Doctor chucked. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “I try to stay away from fixed points. Too easy to muck things up.”

Mickey shook his head in disbelief. “Wow, we’re really here. We’re actually here.” When he saw the Doctor smirking at him again, his smile disappeared. “This doesn’t change anything.” 

“Oh, no, of course not.”

“I’m still angry, yeah?”

“Of course.”

“I mean, just because we ended up where we meant to go this time doesn’t mean you aren’t still a bloody wanker.”

Again the Doctor shot him a look. “Well, there we are then.”

“Right. Just so long as we’re clear about that.” Mickey looked around. “So which way do we go?”

The Doctor pointed directly in front of them. “About three blocks that way is Dealey Plaza and the Texas Schoolbook Depository. If I’m here, that’s where we’ll find me.” 

“How do you know?”

“Because that’s where I’d go,” the Doctor said simply. He took two steps forward and then stopped short. “Almost forgot,” he said. He rummaged deep in one of the pockets of his trousers. After a moment he pulled out what looked like two tiny hearing aids which he pushed into his ears.

“Telepathic dampers,” he said, answering Mickey’s unasked question. “Don’t want him to sense that we’re here. Of course the downside is that I won’t be able to sense him either. We’ll just have to look for him.”

“If you had those, why didn’t you wear them before, when we were lookin’ for him on the Estate?”

“Didn’t have them before. I made them while you were getting changed. It’s not as if I didn’t have enough time. You took longer to get ready than Rose does.”

“Oi, I’m not the one who gave me the wrong directions to the Wardrobe Room! I got lost three times on the way there.”

The Doctor ignored the accusation. Instead he began to lecture as they headed in the direction of the Plaza. “The '60s were an age of enormous turmoil and massive contradictions in America. The Cold War, race riots, the Vietnam War, the space race… Just a few months ago, Martin Luther King gave his iconic ‘I have a Dream’ speech, spurring on the peace movement.” He came to a stop and paused for a moment. “And in an hour’s time, an assassin’s bullet will end the life of President Kennedy, leaving behind a widow, two small children, and a nation in mourning.”

They were both silent for a moment before they continued on down the street. They passed a variety of shops: a butcher’s, a bakery, a tobacconist, a bookstore. All were common to Mickey’s home and era, but somehow they looked different in a way he couldn’t put his finger on. Ahead he heard the strains of music. Next to him the Doctor grinned.

“Ah, a record store. And playing the King of Rock and Roll, Elvis Presley! I bet Rose would love to meet him! Maybe after this is all over…” 

As they walked down Main Street, they joined the crowd that already begun to form. There were people from all walks of life lining the street. Young and old, rich and poor, all races and creeds, all were gathering to catch a glimpse of the presidential motorcade. 

Despite himself, Mickey caught the excitement of the festive atmosphere. Red, white, and blue banners fluttered overhead, suspended on wires that crisscrossed the road. Children darted back and forth, weaving in and out of the crowd while their parents scolded them. Older men congregated in groups smoking cigarettes and cigars, while older women stood apart and gossiped. Police officers wandered up and down the street, while photographers snapped photos of the crowd. 

Mickey stopped and looked around, taking in the surroundings. He’d never been to America, never been back in time, and he wanted to memorize all of it if this was going to be his last trip with the Doctor. 

Beside him he heard someone giggle. He turned to see a group of girls looking at him. One, a pretty young woman in a yellow dress and white cardigan, smiled shyly at him and he smiled back.

“Come on, Mickey,” the Doctor snapped. “You can flirt later. We’ve got a job to do. We’ve got to find me before I get myself into trouble.” He strode down the street, his coat flapping behind him. Mickey had to jog to catch up.

“Why don’t you use your sonic screwdriver to track down your TARDIS like you did last time?” he asked breathlessly.

“Because I don’t want to find the TARDIS, I want to find me.” The Doctor stopped short and scanned the crowd on the other side of the street. “The photo of me here, do you know from what vantage point it was taken?”

Mickey shook his head. “I didn’t see it. Rose did.”

“Hmm. If you were me, Mickey, where would you stand?”

“I dunno. I guess as close to the street as I could.”

“But that’s assuming that the reason I came was to see the motorcade. If I just wanted to see President Kennedy, I’d have gone to his inauguration. No, there’s something else going on here.” He closed his eyes. After several long moments his brow furrowed. “I don’t understand,” he muttered. “This is a fixed point.”

The Doctor opened his eyes and jerked his head towards a building. Mickey nodded and they left the crowd. 

“What’s goin’ on?” Mickey asked.

“I told you about fixed points,” the Doctor said quietly. “The Kennedy assassination is a fixed point. It has to happen. But something’s wrong. Something here is in flux. Something could change. And I don’t know what it is.” He looked around. “Just our being here, our very presence here could change something. And since I’m here twice… We have to find me. And fast. Before I change history.”

If Mickey had thought Main Street had been crowded, that was nothing compared to Dealey Plaza. It was wall to wall people on either side of the road. The Doctor led the way as they fought their way through the crowd, searching for the younger Doctor.

“I don’t see him. You. Whatever.”

“Neither do I,” the Doctor said. “And it’s almost time. The motorcade will be here within minutes.”

“Which one’s the Depository?” 

The Doctor pointed to a tall building about a block back the way they came before returning to scanning the crowd.

“He’s there right now, isn’t he?” Mickey meant Oswald, rather than the younger Doctor, but the Doctor understood what he meant.

“He works there. By now he’s been in the building for hours, biding his time, waiting for everyone to leave so he could set up his rifle.” He huffed in frustration. “There’s too many people. We need to be higher up.”

“How ‘bout over there?”

They fought their way across the street to a sloping grassy area that was high enough to see most of the crowd. The Doctor pulled a pair of opera glasses out of his pocket.

“Much better.”

“Got another pair of those?”

“Yep.”

With the aid of a second pair of opera glasses, Mickey scanned the crowd. “I don’t see… Got ‘im. There he is. Behind that fat guy over there.” The younger Doctor was at street level near the Depository, waving something back and forth. “Looks like he’s looking for something with his sonic screwdriver.”

“What?”

The Doctor turned and looked where Mickey had indicated. “What? What am I…”

In the distance, the crowd began to cheer, and Mickey turned back to looking at the street. “Doctor! Doctor! I think the President's here!”

As a plain, white Ford, the beginning of the motorcade, turned the corner onto Elm Street, Mickey’s heart began to pound. The excitement that he had felt earlier had disappeared, and now he felt sick. This was history for him, he knew what was going to happen, but somehow knowing and doing nothing made it worse.

The next few moments seemed to be in slow motion. As he watched, the white car pulled ahead while a midnight blue convertible, President Kennedy’s car, moved at a crawl around the corner, followed by police escort. Just as Mickey spotted the President and First Lady in the back of the car, he heard the sound of a car backfiring. The President slumped forward. As the First Lady tried to aid her husband, several people in the crowd began screaming. 

Eyes wide with shock, Mickey gasped for air, sickened by the realization that what he had heard was the shot of a sniper’s rifle rather than a backfire, and that he had just witnessed President Kennedy’s assassination.

He had just seen someone murdered. He fought down the urge to vomit.

But it wasn’t over. As confusion reigned, Mickey turned back to look at the younger, leather wearing Doctor. Another shot rang out, and then possibly a third. At the same time, he saw the Doctor lunge to the side, knocking a young woman to the ground.

As time returned to normal, police began to head in the direction of the hill. 

“Doctor!”

The Doctor stood next to him, still staring through the opera glasses, seemingly frozen in shock. Mickey shook his shoulder.

“Doctor! We’ve got to go! Now!” He yanked on his arm. “Run!”

They ran in the opposite direction of the crowd, making a large loop around the Plaza before heading back the way they came. When they reached the TARDIS, the Doctor fumbled with his key before letting them inside.

“I really need to make an electronic key for the TARDIS,” the Doctor said. 

Beside him, Mickey wheezed for air. “I really, _really_ need to work out more.”

The Doctor circled the console, setting the controls. The Time Rotor began to move up and down and the sound of dematerialization echoed through the room.

“Where are we goin’? Aren’t we gonna go back and try to find him again?”

“No need,” the Doctor answered. “Whatever injured both the TARDIS and me didn’t happen here.”

“What did happen?”

“He saved someone’s life. Someone, a young woman who originally died from the ricochet of a bullet fragment, didn’t die now.”

“Didn’t you say that this was a fixed point?”

“The Kennedy assassination was a fixed point,” the Doctor told him. “Her death wasn’t.”

“So you saved someone’s life.”

“It appears so.”

“Is that why you went there, to save her life?”

“I honestly don’t know. I still don’t remember any of this, and that worries me. Really, really worries me.” At Mickey’s questioning look, the Doctor continued. “If I was involved with this situation, if I had somehow met him, to maintain the timelines my younger self would have had to forget this happened until it happened to me, this me. If that had happened, if my involvement here had caused him to force himself to forget this had happened, then the memories of today should be returning to me now. And they’re not. Which means that my memory loss has been caused by something else, something that affected both me and the TARDIS.”

“Which means we’re back to square one.”

“Which means we’re back to square one,” the Doctor agreed.

“So now what?”

“Now we go on to the next place I know I was, and we look for something that could have affected both me and the TARDIS.”

The Doctor moved around the console, setting the next coordinates.

“How do you do it?” Mickey said quietly. “How can you go someplace like that and not do something? I mean, a man was shot, murdered, right in front of us. How can you just watch that happen and not let it affect you?”

“Who says it doesn’t affect me?” the Doctor said in a low voice. “This is why I don’t go to fixed points. The temptation to do something is too great.” He turned to face him. “This is how I see the world, Mickey. Every second of every day of my life, I see what is, what could be, and what can’t. I know what’s right, what has to happen, and more importantly, what’s wrong and mustn’t happen.”

“Is that what happened with Madame de Pompadour?” 

“Yes. Her death at the hands of futuristic robots was wrong. It couldn’t be allowed to happen. I had to stop it. I’m just sorry that you and Rose were hurt by it.”

They both fell silent for a moment, and Mickey was overwhelmed by a glimpse of what it meant to be a Time Lord and by a new sense of what life was like for the Doctor, how he must be filled with agonizing choices every day. He didn’t know how the other man could handle it, day after day, year after year, and if what Rose said was right, century after century. If it was him, he’d want to escape it. Run away, as far away from all of it as he could.

But the Doctor didn’t have that choice. 

Finally the silence between them became oppressive.

“We never found out, did we?” Mickey said, mostly to lighten the mood.

“Found out what?”

“What happened. Whether there was a conspiracy. Whether there was a second gunman. We didn’t even see who was on the grassy knoll.”

The Doctor chuckled. “No, as far as whether there was a conspiracy, whether Oswald acted alone or not, that will have to remain a mystery. But as far as who was on the grassy knoll, I would have thought you’d have figured that out.”

“Who?” Mickey asked. And then the penny dropped. “Us?” The Doctor gave him a nod. “But if we changed time by being there, how could it have been us?”

“There may not have been anyone there before,” the Doctor told him. “Witnesses were divided about that. Or maybe two other people had been there before who weren’t there because we were. Or perhaps there was a ripple effect from our being there. Who knows? Most people consider time to be a straight line, a strict progression of cause to effect, but really it twists and bends, curves and circles upon itself. You can wake up in London in the year 2007 and spend the day creating the seeds of a conspiracy theory in Dallas in 1963.”

Mickey shook his head in disbelief.

The Doctor gave him a rueful grin. “Mickey Smith, welcome to time travel.”


	12. Chapter Eleven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am posting this chapter a little earlier than I expected, but it was ready and I'm going to be busy for the next couple of weeks. I am not sure how soon the next chapter will be done, but it shouldn't be too long.
> 
> I don't usually do trigger warnings on chapters, but I will this time. I'm warning for a discussion of past domestic abuse. It's not particularly graphic or severe, but the discussion is still there. There is also some adult content and swearing.

**Chapter Eleven**

As Rose crossed the room to lock up for the evening, John noticed she was moving a little oddly. She was walking slowly, keeping her shoulders square with her body and not turning her head. When she grimaced when she locked the door, he remembered how hard she had hit the wall when Jimmy had pushed her.

"Are you alright?" he asked.

"I'm fine," she said. She looked over her shoulder at him, and a brief look of pain crossed her face. "I'm just a bit sore."

"Go sit down," he ordered.

"I'm fine," she insisted.

John glanced around the office. Not seeing what wanted, he went into the garage and retrieved a tall stool. He set it down right in front of her.

"Sit."

For a moment she looked like she was going to argue, but she sat down. After a brief search of the desk, he grabbed a small torch out of a drawer and returned to her.

"I've got to check your eyes," he told her. "Alright?" He cupped her face in one hand, forcing down the urge to caress the soft skin of her cheek. He had to focus on what he was doing. Flicking the torch on with his thumb, he shined the narrow light in her eyes, one after the other, making sure her reaction was normal. In his concern for her, he didn't bother to wonder how he knew how to examine for a concussion.

"Any nausea?" he asked.

"No."

First setting the torch aside, he moved around her and began to gently prod her back on either side of her spine, working his way upward to her neck and noting where she winced. When he reached the back of her head, she gasped in pain, a quick inhalation of breath that she tried to hide, and he moved to face her.

"You are hurt," he said, "but not too badly. You've got a few bruises, but thankfully it looks like you don't have a concussion. You'll probably be a little sore for a while. Probably more tomorrow than today."

"I'm fine," she insisted. "Believe me, I've been through a lot worse."

He raised an eyebrow. "Now that worries me."

Rose laughed and then winced again. Frowning, John returned to her back. He rubbed his hands together vigorously, creating friction and warming his palms and fingers. Then he moved his hands to the nape of her neck. He hovered his hands there, warming the air between them and her neck.

"Take deep breaths and let them out slowly," he said and then lowered his fingers to her skin.

His fingertips made feather light circles as they traveled up her spine. When he reached her head again, he placed his thumbs four inches apart and firmly pressed on the base of her skull. She let out a quiet sigh as she instantly began to relax.

"What are you doing?" she asked. "That's fantastic."

"Activating pressure points to try to relieve your pain," he answered.

"Well, whatever that is, it's working," she said. He pressed slightly harder, rubbing in tiny circles. She moaned, a sound that in a different context would be absolutely filthy. That thought was accompanied by the realization that he really wanted to make her make that sound again, and in the other context. He took a deep breath to steady himself and forced himself to let up the pressure.

"Oh, don't stop," she said breathlessly. "'S so good."

He returned to massaging the pressure points, and she sighed again. After another minute, he let go of her. "Feeling better?"

"Mmm, yeah. Don't hurt at all anymore."

"That was only a temporary fix. It won't last. You should probably take a couple of paracetamol and have a hot bath before bed. Maybe I should take you home," he suggested.

"Nope, you're not getting out of this that easily," she said. "You said you were gonna take me out, yeah? I'm holding you to it." She grinned at him, with her tongue touching her teeth again, and inside he melted.

Oh, she was going to be trouble.

He grinned back. "Fantastic."

~oOo~

As if he had read her mind, John took her to a café around the corner. It was one her mother almost never went to, and particularly not on a Saturday night.They were sitting at a tiny table in the far corner, the remnants of burgers and chips in front of them. Rose had ordered a pop which was now half empty, while John had opted for a coffee.

While they had been eating, they had made small talk, about movies and telly and work. But after they had both finished, John crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair, waiting for her to talk about what had happened in the garage. She was struck by a wave of déjà vu. It was so familiar. That had always been the Doctor's listening position. How many times in the past had the Doctor sat just that way in the TARDIS, waiting for her to open up about something she was reluctant to talk about?

"His name's Jimmy Stone," Rose said. "We met when I was sixteen. A bunch of us went out to a club after finishing the last of our GCSEs, and his band was playing there.

"We started dating right away. A few weeks later I moved in with him and got a job to help with the bills instead of going back to school. Mum was furious. She wasn't particularly keen on me doing A-levels, but she hated Jimmy. To tell the truth, she never thought anyone was good enough for me, but as it turned out she was right about him."

While she spoke, John just listened, expressionless. It was exactly the way the Doctor had reacted the first time she had told him about Jimmy. Despite his disdain for domestics, he'd never judged her for anything she'd told him. That had been their way. Between adventures, they'd talk about all sorts of things. Of course she had always been more forthcoming than he had been, but with a phrase here, a sentence there, slowly she had learned a great deal about him, particularly about the Time War and his role in it. Of course, she hadn't learned about regeneration until after it had happened, and she hadn't learned about his previous companions until after she had met Sarah Jane, but over the time they had traveled together they had learned a lot about one another.

But she had never told him the whole story about Jimmy. She'd never told anyone the whole story, not her friends, not Mickey. Not even her mum.

"At first everything was great. But then the band stopped getting as many gigs and we started having money problems. I was working, but it wasn't enough to make up the difference. He started drinking a lot, and when he got drunk he'd get mean. Every couple of weeks or so, he'd go and get really pissed and then come home and yell at me. He'd call me filthy names and blame me for all our problems: I was too fat, I was too lazy, I wasn't making enough money, I wasn't supportive enough, I was holding him back… When he sobered up, he'd be all apologetic and I'd forgive him and then it'd start all over again.

"Then one night, he came back to the flat and said he was leaving me for a waitress he'd met at one of the clubs where the band had played. A week later I found out he'd stopped paying our bills months earlier and that he was traveling in a caravan with the waitress, trying to make a go of performing solo. Evidently that didn't work out, because last I'd heard he'd ended up in prison." She laughed humorlessly. "Guess he's out now.

"Anyway, then I moved back in with my mum, got the job at Henrik's… Took me almost a year to pay everything off. Then the store blew up."

"Did he ever hit you?" John asked quietly. By now he was leaning forward, elbows on knees, and looking at her intently.

She shook her head. "No. First time he ever touched me was at the garage today."

John didn't respond. Instead he just watched her as if he was waiting for more, and she realized he didn't believe her. She took a deep breath.

"Alright, sometimes he'd push me around like he did in the shop."

His face darkened, and she could see fury radiating off him. It reminded her of her first Doctor. She'd only seen the Doctor look that way a couple of times in her travels with him. Usually when he was angry he'd get sarcastic and flippant but he'd hide the rage that simmered below the surface. When he became angry enough that it showed, it was truly frightening.

But she knew she wasn't the one John was angry with.

"Why did you lie to me?" he asked in a controlled voice.

She looked down, unable to meet his eyes. "Because I was embarrassed," she admitted. She began to spin one of her earrings, something she knew she did when she was nervous or uncomfortable. "He'd do it and then cool off and say he was sorry. And I always forgave him. I should have kicked him out the first time it happened. I was so stupid."

"You should have kicked him out," he agreed. "But you were young, not stupid. You loved him and you wanted to believe him." She nodded.

"It's funny. Over the last couple of years I've faced things a lot more dangerous than Jimmy Stone. But when he was in the office, 's like I went back in time. Like I was that same scared sixteen year old."

"Things that scare us when we're young stay with us a long time, sometimes our whole lives," he said. "It's visceral, instinctive. But I promise you, Rose, he is never, ever going to touch you again." Both his expression and tone were deadly serious, and she could hear the truth in that statement. If it was in his power, he'd make sure it never happened again.

And at that moment she was struck even more strongly by how much John was like her first Doctor. The Doctor had told her that John wasn't him, and she vaguely remembered him saying something about the TARDIS inventing John's history, making him believe he was someone else. She had assumed that it meant he would be a different person. But he wasn't.

John reacted to things the same way the Doctor did. Before she could think about that, he spoke.

"So, what happened next?"

"Next?"

"Yeah, next. After the store blew up."

She had known it was coming, questions about the last couple of years of her life, just as soon as he had wanted to know about Jimmy. Actually she'd known it was coming as soon as they had begun spending time with each other, but now the time was here.

And she still hadn't figured out what to tell him. Not to mention she had no idea what he already knew. Their adventures together hadn't happened for him yet, but that didn't mean he didn't know anything about what she'd been up to for the last year. Two actually, she thought, remembering her missing a year due to them arriving home a year late after their first trip. But that didn't mean he didn't know anything. In fact, he probably knew a fair amount already. After all, gossip was the primary pastime of the Estate.

"A friend of mine and I went traveling for a while," she said. "Now it's your turn."

His eyebrows shot up. "My turn?"

"Yep," she said. "Your turn. I told you about Jimmy, so now it's your turn to tell me something." When he didn't answer immediately she continued. "You know, like how long have you been here, what did you do before you were a mechanic…" He still didn't answer so she lightened her tone. "I'm guessing… that you used to be a banker, but you quit when you lost interest."

He snorted. "Nah, I used to be a carpenter, but then I got bored."

She laughed. "After I read Harry Potter I wanted to be a witch for a spell."

He grinned at her. "I was a train conductor for a while, but that got derailed. Then I worked for a blanket factory, but it folded."

"I used to run marathons, but I couldn't stand the agony of da feet."

"I used to sell Velcro, but I couldn't stick with it."

"I used to sell eyeglasses, but I kept making a spectacle of myself."

"I used to be a doctor, but I kept losing my patients." His grin faded. For a moment a puzzled look crossed his face. He fell silent.

"Actually, to tell the truth, I don't remember what I used to do before I became a mechanic," he said when he finally spoke. "'Bout six months ago I came to in an alley not far from here. Didn't remember anything, not what I was doing there, not even who I was. No money, just the clothes on my back and this in my pocket."

He pulled a slim brown wallet out of the back pocket of his jeans. Before he even handed it to her she recognized it as his psychic paper. She flipped it open and saw what appeared to be a driver's license, complete with his name, address, birthdate and photo. She concentrated for a moment, and the image in front of her wavered and became blank for an instant before snapping back into focus.

"According to that, my name is John Smith and I'm from Manchester. But I wasn't even sure that was right. The name didn't feel like mine for some reason. And I later found out the address is for Old Trafford, the stadium where Manchester United plays, or more specifically, for the entrance to the car park."

She handed the wallet back to him, and he slipped it back in his pocket. "So what did you do?"

"Hitchhiked my way up to Manchester," he said. "Lived rough for a while. Did odd jobs to pay for food. Once I was there, I went to the hospital, the halfway houses, the homeless shelters trying to find out if anyone recognized me or if anyone was looking for me. I searched the missing person records at the police department. I searched old newspaper articles, birth records and death records. I found a number of John Smiths, but none matched my description. I widened my search to the surrounding area, and then to all of the UK. I couldn't find anything. No one with the name John Smith that matched my description.

"A few months ago, I gave up and came back here. Every day since then I've been on the computer, searching everywhere I could think of to try and find some trace of who I am. And I haven't found anything."

John fell silent for a moment, and when he continued his face was expressionless, his voice devoid of emotion. "In six months, I haven't found anyone looking for me. I don't think there's even anyone out there to look. No family, no friends. No one."

Rose leaned forward, grabbed his hand and squeezed it. He looked startled for a moment, as if he had forgotten she was there. Then he met her eyes and squeezed back.

"You've got me now," she told him.

He looked completely gobsmacked. His mouth opened and closed several times as if he was searching for something to say. Finally he gave up and smiled.

And she squeezed his hand again and smiled back.

~oOo~

On the way back to their flats, John could tell that Rose's pain had returned. He had told her that the acupressure was only a temporary fix, and all the benefit she had received had apparently worn off now. She was walking stiffly, holding her head and back almost unnaturally straight. Each step seemed to be an effort for her. He felt a surge of rage towards Jimmy Stone. He had meant it when he had told Rose he'd never let the younger man hurt her again.

As they crossed the street, Rose stumbled and gasped. The sound was like a knife in his gut. The idea that someone could hurt her like that… John fought the urge to just pick her up and carry her back to her flat. Although they hadn't known each other long, he was certain she wouldn't appreciate it.

Instead, they walked back slowly, hand in hand. From the moment she had taken his hand in the café, it felt completely natural to hold her hand, as if her hand was made to fit in his. As if it belonged there.

_A hand in his._

When they arrived back at her building, John offered to walk her up. She shook her head.

"You don't have to do that," she said. "It's not far. I'll be fine." At his skeptical look, she continued. "Seriously. I'll be fine. I'm gonna take your advice and have a good, long soak." She let go of him and walked into the entrance of the stairwell. Then she turned back and gave him a cheeky grin. "Unless you want to scrub my back for me."

John leaned back against the door frame, crossed his arms in front of his chest, and raised an eyebrow at her. "You'd better be careful. I might just take you up on that."

She laughed, and then winced. "Maybe next time."

From the door to his own building, he watched as she walked up the stairs in the glass enclosed stairwell and to her flat, taking note of which one she entered. He had neglected to ask her which one she lived in, and he needed to know if he was going to check on her tomorrow.

That thought, about checking on her, reminded him of someone else he had intended to check on. Rose's run-in with Jimmy Stone had pushed all thoughts of checking on Rita out of his mind. But when he knocked on the door of her flat, there was no answer. Well, it was Saturday night, Rita and Chuck's typical night to go out.

As he entered his own flat, the cat wove around his legs, brushing up against him and purring loudly. Without conscious thought, he fed her and gave her fresh water before returning to his computer. He needed to research someone new.

A piece of shit named Jimmy Stone.

~oOo~

Rose lowered herself into the steaming, bubbly water. It felt almost too hot, perfect to relax sore muscles.

Her mother hadn’t been home when she got back to the flat, instead leaving her a note telling her not to expect her until the next morning. Rose was relieved. She was always a little uncomfortable when her mother’s boyfriends spent the night. Not to mention she wouldn’t have to explain to her mum why she was hurt. 

Plus she could spend as much time as she wanted in the tub.

She closed her eyes. Immediately her mind returned to John: John cupping her face as he checked her eyes; John checking her back for bruises; John massaging, almost caressing, the nape of her neck and the back of her head. The Doctor had done that before, but it had always been almost overly clinical as he had examined her. This time it had felt sensual, and here, in the quiet of the bathroom and the privacy of her mind, she could pretend it was erotic.

Her mind wandered, to him coming up with her to the flat. To him scrubbing her back while she was only clothed in bubbles. To hands and lips moving over her, touching and caressing and kissing and tasting. Her hands dropped into the water, her fingertips circling her breasts and moving downward lower and lower until her breath quickened and she was left gasping.

Rose stayed in the bath until the water grew cold. Although the hot water and the painkillers, among other things, had helped relax her and relieve the pain, she was still somewhat shaken over her encounter with Jimmy. Seeing him again brought all those memories of what he would do back in full force: the yelling, the tantrums, the name calling, the shoving… But really, in a weird way he had done her a favor. She had always hated living on the Powell Estate, with people looking down on her because of her address and her accent and her clothes. At the time, seeing him how he really was at the end had been the last straw. It had made her determined to leave someday, to move out of Peckham and run away as far as she could.

By the time she had begun dating Mickey, though, the thought had been pushed to the back of her mind. She had become resigned to living on the Powell Estate for the rest of her life. A life of jobs and telly and beans on toast, as the Doctor said. But it was worse than that. It was always being broke, always having her 'betters' be condescending, always living so close to everyone else that they might have well been in the same room…

But then she had met the Doctor. And turned down his offer to travel with him. The instant he had left she had regretted it, and she had never been more relieved when he had come back.

She'd never thought she'd ever be back here again, not like this. Not working at a boring job and not living with her mother. And particularly not with the Doctor off traveling with Mickey.

It was enough to make her mind spin.

At least John was here.

She dressed in her loosest, most comfortable jimjams and lay down on her bed, thinking about John. Everything he had done today, from the casual flirting with her, to his so easily putting Jimmy on the floor, to his sassiness and awful puns and body language and facial expressions, all was the Doctor she remembered. It was like he was the Doctor, just with a memory loss.

But that's not what the Doctor had told her he'd be like.

Rose tried to remember exactly what the Doctor had said, so she reached over to the bedside table, grabbed the Doctor's hologram cube. She flipped the switch at the bottom, and the hologram of the Doctor began to play again from the beginning.

_"Rose, if you're watching this, it means I've been gone longer than ten seconds…"_

"There's got to be a way to skip some of this," she muttered. She turned it over—and it was a little weird to have the Doctor giving her instructions upside down—and she figured out that by manipulating the switch she was able to fast forward, rewind, and pause the display.

_"C, keep him away from major historical events…"_

"Oops, too far." She pushed the switch in the opposite direction.

_"Now Rose, in this situation there are a number of things to remember…"_

"Here we go," she said.

_"First of all, like I said before, he's not me. Well, he is, but in all the important ways he isn't. The TARDIS will have given him a completely new identity, and he will believe that that's who he is…"_

She rewound it so she could listen to it again.

_"…he's not me. Well, he is, but in all the important ways he isn't. The TARDIS will have given him a completely new identity, and he will believe that that's who he is…"_

She repeated it again.

_"The TARDIS will have given him a completely new identity…"_

She paused the hologram. "But the TARDIS didn't give him a new identity," she told the Doctor's image. "And he doesn't know who he is." She groaned. "Now what do I do?"

After debating for a moment, she grabbed her mobile.

_"You've reached the TARDIS,"_ said a familiar voice with a Northern accent. _"If I'm not here, you've probably got the wrong number. But if this is Rose, and we got separated because you wandered off again, I'm probably already on my way to find you. And if this Jack, no, you can't bring your latest… whatever… back to the TARDIS. Go back to his or her or its place. And if you're in jail, cool off, sober up, and I'll come and get you in the morning."_

Rose stared at her mobile in shock. She'd never phoned the TARDIS and had the call not go to her proper timeline. She tried again, and she received the same message.

She rewound the message on the cube and played it from the beginning.

_"Rose, if you're watching this, it means I've been gone longer than ten seconds. I'm really sorry about that. I truly meant to come back in ten seconds. All I can say is that maybe whatever is going on with his TARDIS is beginning to affect mine."_

She had thought that the reason he was late was just because he was a lousy driver, but maybe there was more to it. If there were problems with the TARDIS, who knew how long he'd be gone.

Or if he'd even be able to get back.

Her mind raced. If she couldn't phone the TARDIS, how could she tell the Doctor that the TARDIS hadn't provided his previous incarnation with an identity? If there was only some way to get a message to him…

She slapped her forehead. "Stupid! I could try to phone Mickey on his mobile!"

She dialed, and at the same time her mum's phone rang.

"Mum must have forgotten her mobile again," she said aloud. As she began to search for her mother's phone, she disconnected the call to Mickey. Her mum's phone stopped ringing.

She rolled her eyes. "Isn't that always the way?" She speed-dialed Mickey again, and the phone began to ring in the other room again. She disconnected, and the ringing stopped.

With a sense of dread, she dialed Mickey again, and the ringing began again. This time she left the connection open, and she traced the source of the ringing to the lounge. The phone was buried in the space between the cushion and the back of one of the imitation leather chairs in front of the television.

That had been the chair Mickey had sat in when they'd had pizza with her mother last week. He must have lost it while he'd been watching telly. The phone ringing had been Mickey's, not her mum's.

"Shit!"

She was stuck on the Estate with no way to contact the Doctor if there was a problem. She was on her own.

No, she wasn't. John was here. And no matter what the Doctor said, even though he didn't remember, even though he was human, John _was_ the Doctor. 

She was sure of it.


	13. Chapter Twelve

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter has taken so long to finish, particularly because it is so short. There were a lot of reasons for that that I won't go into here. Let's just say RL and writer's block were two of the more significant ones.
> 
> I'm not sure when the next chapter will be ready. It's already started, but again, RL has been crazy lately.
> 
> A final note. This chapter turned out a lot differently than originally planned and ended up including a couple of unexpected cameos from a couple of characters I've never written before. I hope I did them justice.

**Chapter Twelve**

John frowned as he stared thoughtfully at his computer monitor. He had spent hours researching Rose’s ex-boyfriend, Jimmy Stone, and what he had found disturbed him.

The stupid ape had been brought up on the Brandon Estate, one that was not too far from the Powell Estate. Single mother, absentee father, barely passed his GCSEs. Formed a band called Shriek with three other blokes: Christopher Neely, Charles Samson, and Reginald Taylor. Lead singer and guitarist, reportedly talented but had frequent run-ins with the local police over drugs, public drunkenness, and brawling. 

Attempted a solo career, short-lived. Arrested on charges of domestic violence (not against Rose), charges later dropped. Arrested for robbing a pub he had been playing at. Convicted and sent to prison for three years. Recently released.

The thought of this man anywhere near Rose sickened him. She had told him that Jimmy had verbally abused her and pushed her around when they were together. He had no doubt she had told him the truth, as far as it went, but he just hoped that there wasn’t more to the story than she had let on. 

Although he had warned Rose’s ex-boyfriend to stay away from her, he had no confidence that the younger man would actually leave her alone. He’d have watch out for him. There was no way he’d let Jimmy hurt her again.

For a moment he wished he had a time machine so he could go back in time and stop Jimmy hurting her, or from even meeting her in the first place. Then he snorted at the thought.

“Me with a time machine,” he said, shaking his head. “I must be losin' it.”

~oOo~

The morning after going to Dallas, Mickey had a quick breakfast before making his way to the console room.

The trip to the Kennedy assassination the day before had been disturbing to say the least, but once back on the TARDIS the horror of what he had witnessed quickly faded and he began yawning loudly. The Doctor had sent him to get some food and some sleep, saying he would need it before their next stop. He himself would work on the TARDIS while Mickey rested. Evidently Time Lords didn’t need as much sleep as mere humans. 

Completely knackered, Mickey had been grateful for the break between adventures. Although he’d never admit that to the Doctor. The arrogant git.

As Mickey entered the room, the Doctor called, “Careful where you step.”

Several sections of the metal grating surrounding the console had been removed and set to the side, revealing a number of compartments for storage and for accessing various portions of the TARDIS’s circuitry. The Doctor was lying on his stomach, his right arm shoulder deep within one of them as if he were reaching for something. Mickey could hear the whirr of the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver coming from somewhere underneath him.

“What are you doing?”

“Trying to override the space-time redundancy limiter. It’s preventing us from landing at our next destination.”

“Hitting it with a mallet isn’t enough this time?”

To Mickey’s surprise, the Doctor took his mocking comment seriously. He shut off the screwdriver and sat up.

“No, in this case the mallet won’t help. She not only doesn’t want to land, she is programmed not to land. I have to rewire her circuitry to override it.”

“Where are we going that she’s programmed not to land?”

“To the Titanic launch. That’s the next stop on our list. Well, it’s either that or Krakatoa, and with the way the TARDIS is acting up, I don’t want to risk an exploding volcano if we don’t have to.”

“I don’t get it,” Mickey said. “What’s so special about the Titanic that the TARDIS is programmed not to go there?”

“It has nothing to do with the Titanic,” the Doctor told him. “It’s that she’s programmed not to land somewhere where I already am. Usually I can persuade her to do it anyway if necessary—”

“Like you _persuaded_ her last time?”

“But this is different,” the Doctor continued as if Mickey hadn’t spoken. “I’m already there.”

“Yeah, but isn’t that the point of us going? Because you already went?”

“This is different,” the Doctor said again. “When I went, I was already there. I remember being there.”

“I thought you said you didn’t remember going,” Mickey said.

“I don’t remember going,” the Doctor said. “Not after I met Rose.” He let out a huff of irritation. “Why on Earth would I go there of all places? I had to know the risk. I was already there, and I knew it.”

“What do you mean you were already there?”

“I was already there when I went,” he told him. “And if the two of us go, I’ll be there three times.”

Mickey’s eyes widened when he suddenly realized what the Doctor meant. “You mean you were there before…”

“Yep.”

“And then you went again…”

“Yep.”

“And now you’re goin’ the same place and time for the third time?”

“Yep.”

Mickey laughed nervously. “What could happen if you’re there three times?”

“I don’t know,” the Doctor admitted.

“Well, you know what they say,” Mickey said. “Three times the charm, yeah?”

“They also say ‘bad things happen in threes.’”

~oOo~

Rose placed Mickey’s mobile on a nearby table before sinking down on the chair and staring at her own. She was certain the Doctor needed to know that the TARDIS hadn’t given John a new identity in order to figure out what was wrong. But how could she tell him if she couldn’t even phone him?

“Now what?” she said aloud. Her brow furrowed in frustration and puzzlement. “Doctor, what do I do?”

When after several moments no ideas presented themselves, she impulsively speed-dialed the TARDIS again in hopes of the call reaching her current Doctor this time. After all, she told herself, if she reached the other Doctor’s answer phone again, she could just ring off as she had before.

But she didn’t reach her Doctor in pinstripes, nor did she reach the earlier Doctor’s answer phone. 

_“Rose, where are you?”_ her first Doctor asked.

Never forgetting the possibility of reapers, her first instinct was to immediately disconnect before she spoke. But she didn’t. The temptation of talking to the Doctor, either Doctor, who actually remembered that he was the Doctor, was too strong.

“Um…”

 _“I told you I’m not comin’ for tea,”_ he said firmly.

Rose blinked. _Tea?_

 _“I was just about to call you anyway,”_ he continued without allowing her to answer. _“I thought you’d be here by now. I’m done repairing the TARDIS temporal vector relay. It’s time to go.”_

“Go?” she asked.

 _“Yeah, we’ve got to get goin’.”_ After a moment’s silence he continued, his voice soft and low. It was devoid of emotion. Rose knew from long experience that that was the way he got when he felt hurt. _“Did you change your mind about the plasma storm?”_

“Plasma storm?” she asked, scanning her memory. They had been to a number of plasma storms since they had begun traveling together.

 _“Yeah, the plasma storm in the Horsehead Nebula,”_ he said. _“We just talked about going a couple of hours ago. Are you alright?”_

She suddenly remembered which plasma storm he was talking about. They had gone right after that first trip home to see her mother. “No. I mean yes,” she said, quickly correcting herself. “I’m fine, and I haven’t changed my mind. I’ll be there soon. Probably already on the way.”

 _“Probably?”_ he asked, his voice laced with amusement.

 _Oops. Shouldn’t have said probably_ , she thought. 

“I’ve got to go… got to finish getting ready, yeah? Be there soon.”

_“Don’t be late. I’m not gonna wait forever, y’know.”_

Despite the seriousness of the situation, she smiled at the empty threat. For all his gruff words, he had always waited for her.

“See you soon,” she promised.

After she rang off, she stared again at her mobile. Instead of reaching her current Doctor, or even her first Doctor while they had been traveling with Jack, that call had been routed to a time early in their relationship, only days after they had begun traveling together in fact. There had to be something seriously wrong with the TARDIS. She had known that there was something wrong with the TARDIS from the moment it had brought them here, but she had had no idea the extent of the problem. And neither did the Doctor.

Her mind returned to the conversation she had just had. In his timeline, it had happened only days after they had begun traveling together...

Could she somehow warn him there was something wrong? Would she be creating a paradox if she warned him?

Or would she be preventing one?

And even if she did manage to warn him without creating a paradox, would it be too late to do any good? As John, the Doctor was in that tiny amount of time between him meeting her and them traveling together. She’d have to warn the Doctor there was a problem after she’d met him but before the TARDIS had used the chameleon arch on him for it to do any good. A tiny sliver of time, and there was no guarantee that she’d reach him then.

She bit her lip as she continued to stare at her mobile. Should she risk it? 

Did she dare not to?

“God, what do I do? What do I do?” 

After running through all the possible things that could go wrong – primarily paradoxes and reapers – she decided she had to risk it. 

“I’ll just be real careful, yeah?” she said to herself. “Tell him something’s wrong without giving him too much information. Let him take it from there.”

Before she could change her mind, she took a deep breath and rang the TARDIS again. In her ear she could hear the phone ring one, two, three times before it was answered.

_“This is the Doctor. Who is this please?”_

Rose’s eyes widened in shock. Her heart pounded. She didn’t recognize the voice. 

The person – _the Doctor_ – on the other end of the connection had a posh accent. She knew the Doctor could regenerate, and after meeting Sarah Jane she knew that the older woman had traveled with an incarnation that she, Rose, had never met. 

She knew the TARDIS was having problems linking her mobile to her proper timeline, but it hadn’t occurred to her she could end up accidentally ringing a Doctor she didn’t know.

_“Hello? Hello?”_

“Sorry, wrong number,” she said and quickly disconnected the call.

“Oh, god,” she said. She swallowed hard. “Well, that was a mistake.”

~oOo~

Ten thousand years and countless light years away, the TARDIS hung in the open, empty space between galaxies. Despite being the same TARDIS that Rose traveled in, she would have found it almost unrecognizable. Unlike the coral walls, metal floor gratings, and beat up leather jump seat she was used to, the walls of the console room were marble and lined with bookcases containing a variety of classic works from dozens of planets. Paintings by da Vinci, Manet, and Renoir, and statues by Michelangelo and Donatello adorned the room. Priceless Oriental rugs lay atop floors made from English oak. An ancient phonograph, a chess set (with a game in progress), and Tiffany lamps sat on antique tables. Completing the décor were comfortable upholstered chairs and settees that looked like they would be more at home in a stately English manor than an alien time machine.

The central console, made of a dark wood, was almost unrecognizable as well. It was surrounded by arching metal struts which met high overhead and helped support the tall glass column that held the time rotor. The rotor itself glowed purplish blue, adding to the glow provided by the lamps and the flickering yellow light from candelabras placed strategically around the room.

At the console stood two people, a young blonde woman in a full length burgundy gown and a man with chestnut, shoulder-length locks wearing a silk cravat and a velvet jacket in a deep red. The man stared thoughtfully at an old fashioned telephone receiver in his hand.

“Who was that, Doctor?” the woman asked.

“I don’t know, Charley,” the Doctor responded. “I didn’t recognize her voice.”

“Her?”

The Doctor ignored, or perhaps didn’t even notice, the slight hint of jealousy in her voice. “Yes, her,” he said. “A young woman, probably from 21st century London based on her accent and the sound of her voice. But the question is not ‘who is she’ but how did she manage to ring the TARDIS?” He chuckled. “She said she had a wrong number, but that’s impossible. It’s impossible to ring the TARDIS without her approval.” He paused for a moment, considering the problem. “Perhaps she’s a companion of mine.”

“But wouldn’t you know who she was if she had been a companion of yours?”

The Doctor’s mouth twisted into a small, ironic smile. “Not necessarily. But it’s possible she’s not a past companion but a future one.” He replaced the telephone receiver and looked up at Charley. “But if she’s a future one, best we not think too long on it. I don’t want to accidentally cause a paradox.”

She snorted. “No, if _you_ create a paradox, you want to do it on purpose.”

He grinned at her. “Quite right.”


	14. Chapter Thirteen

**Chapter Thirteen**

_The night sky glowed red and gold, reflecting the fire on the ground. Fire was everywhere, burning everything in its path. Golden sand to fields of red, trees of silver to towns and cities, everything was ablaze._

_Screams filled the night…_

At the sound of screaming, John bolted upright. He was on his feet and pulling on his jeans before he was even fully awake. The sound penetrated his sleep-fogged brain, and he realized the screams existed in reality, not just in his nightmares.

As the cries continued, his first thought was of Rose. Convinced that Jimmy had returned and she was in danger, he was out the door within seconds.

Once outside however, it was apparent that the sounds were coming from the floor below rather than from Rose's flat across the courtyard. It was Rita and Chuck again, but this time instead of sounding angry, Rita sounded frightened.

John ran down the walkway and down the stairwell. Behind him, doors opened as the residents of the Estate again turned out to witness the spectacle, drawn by the same urge that drove people to slow down to witness an auto accident.

When he got to their floor, he found Chuck grasping Rita by the shoulders and shaking her. No one was moving to aid her. A second later, Chuck was on his knees, one arm behind his head, held in place by the pressure John was placing with his thumb and middle finger on his palm and the back of his hand.

"That's enough!" John ordered. Chuck struggled to get away, and John increased the pressure on his hand. "No more! How many stupid apes do I have to deal with in one day?" His voice was laden with disgust. He turned his head and scowled at the crowd. "And what's wrong with the rest of you? Why is it that I'm the only one helping her? No, you're all satisfied to stand around gawking while a woman gets hurt. Useless, the lot of you!"

On the other side of the courtyard, Rose woke to the sounds of screaming. Her first instinct was to go back to sleep. When she was growing up, screaming in the middle of the night wasn't uncommon on the Estate. Her mother had always forbidden her from leaving the flat to witness that dark side of the neighborhood, and as a young child there had been nothing she could do about it anyway.

But she was no longer a young child. She had faced Slitheen and werewolves, Sycorax and Daleks; humans didn't hold the same fears for her.

She slipped on her shoes and headed out of the flat. The commotion was emanating from the building across the way. She crossed to the railing, but despite the streetlights, she wasn't able to identify who was involved in the fight. It was just too dark.

A commanding voice carried across the courtyard. "I said no more, so knock it off!"

It was John.

"Knock it off!" he shouted again.

Rose pushed her way through the gathering crowd and ran flat out down the stairs and across to the other building. Even though she was in the best shape she had been in since she was seven, she was still out of breath by the time she reached the floor where John was.

The Estate was fairly small and when she had lived there she knew most of the people who lived on it, but she was still surprised when she recognized the rowing couple. John was standing behind a kneeling, whimpering Chuck while Rita stood with her back against the wall, cupping her face in one hand. Even in the dim light coming from the courtyard and from the open doors of the nearby flats, Rose could see she was crying.

At her appearance, both Rita and Chuck froze, as if the shock at seeing her had made them forget the row that had brought her there.

"Rose?" Rita asked incredulously.

"I thought your boyfriend killed you," Chuck said.

John, however, didn't seem surprised at all to see her. He jerked his head towards the flat.

"Rose, take Rita inside while I finish dealing with this stupid ape here," he ordered.

Rose wrapped her arm around Rita's shoulders and led her into the flat. She shut the door behind them.

The flat was a smaller version of the one Rose had grown up in, similar in layout and size to Mickey's only far cleaner. The door opened up to a small living room, barely large enough for the chair, sofa and television that were in it. On the other side of the room were the kitchen and bathroom, and the single bedroom was in the back.

Rose led Rita to the sofa and they both sat down. Rose spotted a nearby box of tissues and handed Rita a couple.

"So when did you get back? I thought you were still travelin'," Rita said. She wiped her face with the tissue and blew her nose loudly.

"I've been back for 'bout a week," she said. "But that's not important right now. What happened?"

"Same ol', same ol'," Rita said.

Rose groaned. "What did he do this time?"

"He's been shaggin' everythin' in a skirt," Rita told her. "We've been rowin' 'bout it, and this time, well…"

It was obvious what she meant. There was a large bruise forming on her left cheek and jaw, and her left eye was beginning to swell.

"Rita, how long are you gonna let him do this to you?" Rose asked. "You need to kick him out. For good this time."

"I want to," Rita said. Rose raised her eyebrows disbelievingly. "No. Seriously. After this I'm done. But I can't kick him out. Flat's in his name."

Raised voices carried through the thin door to the flat. Chuck was cursing at John. They couldn't hear what John said in response, but his tone was even and firm.

"You must have somewhere to go," Rose said. "I know you have some family somewhere. What about your mum?"

As the cursing outside continued, Rita shook her head. "Can't go there. Mum's new boyfriend is creepy, stares at me all the time."

Rose sighed. "Been there. What about Marie? Or Joe?" she asked, naming Rita's siblings. Both lived only minutes away.

"Marie and her husband have three kids now, and his brother is livin' with them too. And Joe's in a bedsit. You know how they are. There's barely enough for him, let alone me. She paused thoughtfully. "Might be able to stay wi' Dad for a bit. He's always hated Chuck. His flat's pretty small and he's got his girlfriend and her kids there, but I could probably sleep on the sofa for a couple weeks."

"Sounds like a plan," Rose said. "Next step we call him, let him know you're comin'. Where's your mobile?"

Rita pointed at the small table crammed between the sofa and the chair. Rose handed it to her and then headed back outside to give her some privacy.

Across from the door, John was leaning against a concrete support beam, arms crossed in front of his chest.

"You're still here," she said. "Where's Chuck?"

"Gone," he told her. "For now. But he'll be back." He jerked his head in the direction of the flat. "Is she okay?"

Rose shrugged. "She will be, if she doesn't take him back again." She crossed the walkway and rested her arms on the railing. The crowd that had formed in the courtyard and the balconies of the other buildings was dwindling. John joined her at the railing and they watched the rest of the people return to their flats.

"Everyone's going home," she said.

"Stands to reason. Show's over."

They both turned at the sound of the door opening behind them. Rita stood silhouetted in the doorway, the light from the flat shining out from behind her, illuminating the walkway.

"Joe's comin' to stay tonight. That's my brother," Rita said, explaining who Joe was for John's benefit. "We'll figure out everythin' else in the morning."

"I'll stay until he comes," Rose told her. As Rita reentered the flat, Rose turned to John. "You wanna come in too?"

"Nah. I'm fine here."

Rose nodded and began to head back into the flat, but before she crossed the threshold she turned back. He had returned to leaning on the post with his arms crossed in front of him. He looked like a security guard or a bouncer at a club.

Or simply just her first Doctor.

He gave her a small smile, and she smiled back before rejoining Rita.

~oOo~

Less than half an hour later, Rita's brother arrived. He and Rita thanked both Rose and John for their help in dealing with Chuck. After the door to the flat had closed behind them, Rose and John stood in the walkway. As neither moved to leave, an awkward silence descended between them.

"What time d'you think it is?" Rose asked after a moment.

"About half three, I imagine," John told her.

"Well, I guess I should get home," she said.

"Yeah, you probably want to get back to bed," he said.

"Not really. Actually I'm wide awake."

"That'll be the adrenalin in your system," he said. "Fight or flight response. Normal reaction to a row, even if you aren't directly involved in it." He let out an irritated huff. "I'm just glad her brother's here to sort it. I'm tired of doin' it. This whole thing's a bit too domestic for me."

She grinned. "She was lucky to have you here to help her," Rose told him.

He grunted noncommittally. "Nothin' anyone else wouldn't do."

"Liar," she said, and she grinned at him affectionately for a moment before turning serious again. "No one else was helpin' her. Only you."

"And you," he said pointedly.

"We make a good team," she said.

"That we do," he agreed.

A light breeze blew through the walkway. Rose wrapped her arms tightly around herself and shivered. "Might be July, but it's still cold at 3 in the morning."

"I'd offer you my jumper, but I didn't put it on before I left my flat. All I've got is my t-shirt."

She grinned at him. "Yeah, I noticed," she said cheekily.

John raised his eyebrows at the overt flirt. Before he could reply, she shivered again. He frowned. "You need to get inside." He paused for a moment and then continued hesitantly, "I don't suppose you wanna go have a cup of tea with me."

"What, now?" she asked. "Dunno if anything's open, and I'm not exactly dressed for it." She was still wearing what she had worn to bed, an oversized sleep shirt, bright pink and patterned with something that wasn't clear in the dim light. Underneath she was wearing exercise shorts, and on her feet were her trainers, but no socks.

He chuckled. "Yeah, I noticed," he said. "What's that on your shirt? Looks like… little moons wearing nightcaps?"

Her eyes widened and she quickly glanced down at herself. She laughed nervously. "Uh, no, actually. Actually they're… bananas in nightcaps."

He grinned. "Bananas are good. Full of potassium. Just never thought of 'em as sleepwear."

"It was a gift," she explained.

He nodded. "Actually… about the tea… I meant in my flat. I don't have much in, but I've got that. So, wanna come up?"

She bit her lip and smiled shyly. "Yeah, okay. I'd like that."

"Fantastic."

~oOo~

As John led them into his flat, Rose looked around the main room. It was almost Spartan in its appearance: nothing was out of place, not a cup, not old takeaway containers, not even a piece of cast off clothing. In some ways it was exactly what she would have expected, stark, with no nonsense furnishings and nothing beyond the bare essentials, exactly the opposite of her mother's flat. There were no pictures on the wall, no photos of family, no stray paperbacks or magazines or tabloids spread out over the table and floor. Even the rundown condition of the worn furniture and the thread-bare rug—worn down to the floorboards in spots—in the room seemed right. They reminded her of the metal grating and the tears on the jump seat in the console room of the TARDIS.

But it still seemed wrong that the Doctor, even a human version of the Doctor who didn't remember he was the Doctor, should live in a tiny, rundown flat on the Estate and not a bigger-on-the-inside time and space ship that traveled among the stars.

"You go sit down while I make the tea," he said. "You take milk or sugar?"

"Both," she told him, still shivering.

John frowned. "Hang on one minute." He disappeared into an adjoining room and returned with a blanket—and his leather jacket. After dropping the blanket on the sofa he handed the jacket to her. "Put this on," he ordered. "I'll be right back."

As he left the room, she slipped on his jacket. She had worn it before, and it was just as warm as she remembered. As she wrapped herself in it, she clutched the collar tightly closed and buried her nose into the deceptively soft leather. Wearing it felt like being enveloped in a big hug from the Doctor, something she hadn't had since he had left a week earlier. She inhaled deeply, taking in the scents of the leather and his aftershave and him. Her mouth curved into a small smile, a smile that slowly faded. Even though he was here, she missed him, missed how well he had known her, missed their shared history—a history that hadn't happened for him yet.

And she missed his next self, his thick brown hair and sideburns, his brown pinstriped suit, his deep, chocolate brown eyes that could see into her soul…

Whether blue eyes or brown, whether leather or pinstripes, she missed the Doctor. John might be the Doctor, but with his memory gone he was missing an enormous part of who he was, and she missed that part of him.

Still shivering a little, she sat down on the sofa and pulled the blanket over herself. _I just hope the Doctor and Mickey sort this soon,_ she thought.

~oOo~

A few minutes later, John carried two mugs into the room. He stopped just inside the doorway. Rose was on the sofa, buried under the blanket he had left for her. Peeking out from under the blanket was the collar of his leather coat.

She was staring off into space, lost in thought and frowning slightly. When she caught sight of him she gave him a bright smile.

"Warmer?" he asked as he crossed over to her.

She nodded. "Loads."

"Good." He handed her one of the mugs and joined her on the sofa.

"Ta," she said. She took a sip. "Mmm, good."

"So how do you know Rita and Chuck?" he asked.

"Rita and I were in school together. Chuck was in the same band as Jimmy. We used to all hang out together." She paused for a moment. "Y'know, I used to be so jealous of the two of them after Jimmy took off, but it didn't take me long to realize I was the lucky one, yeah? If Jimmy hadn't left, that could have been me in there."

John shook his head. "You're too smart for that. It may have taken you a bit, but you would have eventually wised up and dumped him."

"I'd like to think that was true, but I dunno," she said. "I was really messed up back then. Would have done almost anything to keep him."

"You seemed a little down before, when I came back with the tea," he said. "Is that what you were thinking about?"

"No," she said. "Was actually thinking about something else." She paused, as if she was wondering what to say, or if she should say anything at all. He waited her out, hoping she would open up to him. It must have worked, because after a moment she began to talk again. "'S just, I needed to talk to someone, but when I rang him I couldn't get through."

His stomach tightened into a knot. For days he had forgotten, or intentionally ignored the fact that she had spent the last two years traveling with someone, and according to the newspaper, it had been an older man.

"The person you had been traveling with?" he asked. He forced himself to use a light tone, rather than the jealous growl that had threatened to come out.

She looked taken aback at the question. "Yes, actually. He was supposed to be back by now, and when I tried to call him I couldn't get through."

"So you're worried."

"Yeah."

"Is there anything I can do?"

She shrugged. "Not really."

"Why don't you tell me about him," he said.

Her brow furrowed, and she sank her teeth into her lower lip, an unconscious habit that John had discovered usually meant she was nervous.

"Uh… I don't know what to say," she said. "Um, what do you want to know?"

He shrugged. "Whatever you want to tell me. Why don't you start with his name," he suggested. "How you started traveling with him. Where you went."

"His name's the Do—I mean, his name's… James McCrimmon, but everyone calls him the Doctor," she said. "And he travels, all over. Like, everywhere. We've been to Scotland, Anc—Rome, New… uh, New York, Utah, France." That last location was accompanied by a tiny frown, but then her face lightened. "Once we were headed to Naples, but we ended up going to Cardiff instead. He said he was gonna take me to Barcelona, but we haven't gone yet."

"He doesn't have a job? He just travels around? Like on holiday?"

" 'S more than that. Wherever he goes, he helps people."

"You said he's a doctor. Is he part of a group… like Doctors Without Borders?"

She shook her head. "He doesn't help like that. Well, sometimes I s'pose, but mostly not. He just helps people with whatever they need. He's… brilliant. Can do most anything he sets his mind to. And I help him."

"Like an assistant?"

"No," she said. "Not an assistant. More like… a friend, yeah?" She met his eyes. "I try to help him, as much as I can, but I don't think he really needs my help." She paused, just for a moment, before she continued in a softer tone. "See, he's all alone. His family's all gone. Mostly I think I'm just someone to keep him company."

He searched her face. The look of melancholy she had worn earlier had rapidly changed to merriment while she was talking about her travels with the Doctor. Now it had just as quickly turned into sadness.

"Rose, were you…"

"Was I what?"

"Never mind. None of my business," he said.

"No, what?"

He hesitated, just for a second, before asking what he really wanted to know. "Were you and he…"

Her mouth twisted into a small smile. "No," she said. "No, we weren't. Aren't. We're just friends."

Without conscious thought he took her hand and squeezed it. "You wanna know what I think? I think, wherever he is, he's probably fine," he told her. "He probably just got held up somewhere. And Rose Tyler, I think you're absolutely fantastic. If he thinks of you as just someone to keep him company… then I don't care how brilliant he is, he's a complete idiot."

She burst out laughing. "If you knew, if you had any idea…"

He gave her a wide grin. "And you can tell him I said that."

"Oh, I will. Believe me, I will."

Still chuckling, she stretched and then winced.

John frowned. "Is your back bothering you again?"

"A little bit," she answered.

"Did you have a hot soak before bed?"

She rolled her eyes. "Yes, and took some paracetamol. It helped a bit, but what really helped was that thing you did back at the garage. What was it called?"

"It's a form of acupressure. Take off the jacket and turn around."

She slowly slipped off the jacket and set it on the edge of the sofa before turning and facing the opposite direction.

Now that she had taken his jacket off, it became obvious that the sleep shirt she wore was thinner than the shirt she had worn to work, and in the light of the room it was also obvious she wasn't wearing a bra. That in addition to being in his flat in the middle of the night made the situation far more intimate than it had been in the shop in late afternoon. His heart pounded in his chest and it felt like butterflies had taken up residence in his stomach. He took a deep, steadying breath.

Although his hands weren't cold, he rubbed them together vigorously and then cupped them over his mouth and breathed on them, warming them before lowering them to her shoulders. She shivered.

"Are you cold?" he asked in a low voice.

"No," she said softly.

He swallowed hard before beginning to gently massage her shoulders and back. "Take deep, slow breaths," he said.

He worked his hands from a spot between her shoulder blades upwards to the back of her neck. Her skin was so warm, so soft. She sighed, and it was all he could do to prevent himself from turning the gentle massage into a lover's caress, prevent himself from dipping his head and placing kisses on the sensitive spot between her neck and shoulder. He moved closer, close enough to smell a trace of her shampoo. It was intoxicating. He closed his eyes and took in the scent as his thumbs moved in circles over the pressure points on the base of her skull. With a quiet hum, she relaxed against his fingertips.

Finally, after several minutes he had to stop as any more would have done more harm than good. He moved his hands back to her shoulders, reluctant to completely pull his hands away from her.

She turned to face him. Her eyes were wide and dark.

"Thank you," she said softly.

"You're very wel—" he began.

"Not just for the massage," she said. "Thank you for everything. Thank you for helping Rita, and for dealing with Jimmy, and for listening to me talk. Thank you for just being here with me." She leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek, and then rubbed the spot with her fingertips. Impulsively he pulled her into his arms and leaned back against the back of the sofa. She rested her head on his shoulder and snuggled against him, bonelessly molding her body to his. He rested his chin on the top of her head.

"Rose Tyler, I'm so glad I met you," he said.

"Me too."


	15. Chapter Fourteen

**Chapter Fourteen**

"Ha!" the Doctor said triumphantly as he crawled out from underneath the console. "Dismantled the space-time redundancy limiter. Now all that's left is to set the coordinates for Southampton, 10 April, 1912. But before I do that, the question is, 'Where will I be?'"

"Can't we just look for you the way we did last time?" Mickey asked.

He had been sitting on the jump seat, dressed in clothes appropriate for England in the early twentieth century, and watching the Doctor working on the TARDIS for what felt like hours. After Dallas, his initial excitement at traveling to key points in history was gone. At this point he was just anxious to get the trip over with.

The Doctor shook his head. "We could, but the risk of detection is much greater. We need to figure out what he's doing there and what might have happened to both him and the TARDIS without either of my previous selves realizing that we are there."

Mickey shook his head. "I'm going with you to look for you to find out what you are up to, and at the same time we have to avoid being spotted by you. And another you. This is giving me a headache."

"If we don't solve this undetected, we'll have a lot more to worry about than a simple headache. This situation is much more delicate for reasons beyond just running into myself in triplicate. That's dangerous enough, but we're crossing my timeline in a way that has the potential to shatter the fabric of space-time."

"I don't get it. How is this different than what we did before?"

The Doctor didn't answer immediately, and when he finally spoke, his voice was low, his tone more serious than Mickey had ever heard before. "Mickey, has Rose ever told you about the Time War?"

"Yeah, a little. When you sent her back that time and we opened up the TARDIS console so she could get back to you."

"What did she tell you?"

"Just that there was a war, a big war that could have destroyed the entire universe," Mickey said.

"Anything else?"

"Yeah, that you ended it somehow," Mickey said grudgingly. Part of him was still resistant to acknowledge anything good the Doctor had done. "And managed to save the universe from being destroyed."

"When you met me, I was fresh from the Time War, but the other me we are trying to avoid has not yet fought in the War. For him, the War hasn't even begun. Only the first battles have been fought, and it isn't at all clear to anyone that a full blown war is about to start. And for him, our planet is still there, our people are still there. If we have contact with him, we could unintentionally change the outcome of the War. And if we did that… well, we wouldn't have to worry about what I did on the Titanic, because the entire planet wouldn't be here.

"That's why we absolutely can't interact with him in any way. And the only sure way to do that is to try and avoid those places where he was. And since I don't remember everywhere I was, the only way to do _that_ is to know exactly where we'll find the me you know, find him and find out what we need to know, and then get out of there as quickly as possible."

"You don't remember where you were the first time you were here?" Mickey asked incredulously.

The Doctor gave him a withering look. "It was at least a hundred years ago, possibly a lot more. In comparison, I'd ask you if you remember where you were on a specific day ten years ago, but you probably don't even remember what you had for tea last Tuesday."

"Yes, I do!" Mickey automatically replied. "I had…" His forehead wrinkled in thought. "I had… Damn, what did I have?"

"You had fish and chips," the Doctor told him.

Mickey's jaw dropped. "How do you know that?"

"I was there," he said. "It was while we were sorting that business at Deffry Vale with Sarah Jane."

"Was that only last Tuesday? Seems like longer ago than that."

"That's what time travel does. Completely screws up your sense of linear time. Anyway… to get back to the matter at hand, we need to figure out approximately where my last self is going to be so we can find him without running into, well, me."

"So how do we do that?"

"Mickey, did Rose tell you anything about that picture of me on the Titanic? Whether I was on the ship itself or on the dock? Who I was with perhaps."

Mickey screwed up his face in concentration. Finally he shook his head. "I don't think she told me, and if she did, I don't remember. That was a long time ago."

The Doctor let out a harrumph of frustration.

"Why don't we just call Rose?" Mickey asked. "I mean, she's the one who actually saw the picture. She should be able to tell you."

"I really, really don't want to do that," the Doctor told him. "I promised her I'd be back in ten seconds. Once we phone her, we put ourselves into her timeline. If we reach her an hour later, or a day later, we won't be able to come back when I said we would."

"So if we call her and she says we've been gone a week, then we can't go back until a week after we left. Right?"

The Doctor's eyes widened in surprise. "Yes, that's it exactly."

"Which is more important, getting back ten seconds after we left, or not running into that other you?"

The Doctor's mouth opened… and then abruptly shut. With a growl of frustration, he picked up the receiver and began to dial. After a moment listening, his brow furrowed in confusion.

"What?" he muttered. He hung up the phone and pulled his glasses out of his pocket. He peered through them at the communication control panel on the console. "Hmmm." He picked up the receiver and tried again. The look of confusion grew. "This is impossible." He disconnected and urgently dialed twice more, each time becoming more and more panicked.

"What's goin' on?" Mickey asked.

"I don't know," the Doctor said. "And when I say I don't know, I mean I really, really don't know. This shouldn't be able to happen." He pressed a button and a mechanized voice echoed through the chamber.

_"Your call could not be completed. The number you have dialed is out of range._

_"Your call could not be completed. The number you have dialed is out of range._

_"Your call could not be completed. The number you have dialed is out of range._

_"Your call could not be completed…"_

The Doctor quietly pressed a button and the voice was silenced. He stared expressionless at the console.

"What does that mean, out of range?"

He turned to face Mickey and leaned against the console with his arms and ankles crossed. "One of three possibilities. First, that somehow Rose has moved out of the range of the TARDIS's communications systems, and since she's on Earth that would mean the entire planet was out of range as well. Either moved to where even the TARDIS couldn't find her or totally destroyed. Not entirely impossible, but extremely unlikely."

The phrase _totally destroyed_ left a sick feeling in the pit of Mickey’s stomach. 

“Okay,” he said. He swallowed nervously. “Uh, so I guess that’s out.”

“Possibility number two,” the Doctor continued. “Somehow we are out of range of her. That's even less likely, because we're in the Time Vortex. Within the Vortex, the TARDIS essentially touches every point in space and time at the same time. That's how she's able to disappear from one spot and reappear at another instantaneously."

"What's the third one?"

"That the TARDIS herself is having trouble sending a signal out of the Time Vortex." The Doctor didn't continue. Instead he returned to examining the console, this time without his typical exuberance.

"And?"

"And… that means whatever damaged the TARDIS in the past has filtered through time to affect us," he said. He began to rapidly type into a keyboard that had suddenly appeared on one of the control panels. Or at least Mickey had never noticed it before. "And that means it might be difficult for the TARDIS to navigate in and out of the Vortex. In fact, we may not be able to get out of the Vortex at all. If we do, we probably won't be able to get back in." He said it in a matter-of-fact way, as if he was discussing the weather in London or the taste of his tea. In fact, Mickey was certain the Doctor would have shown more emotion about the rain or sugar content in his tea.

"So we'd better get you back home," the Doctor continued. He moved to another control panel on the console. "Let's see, Powell Estate, Sunday, 8 July, 2007. Ten o'clock in the morning, just to be safe."

"No."

The Doctor turned back to him. "No?"

"No," Mickey repeated. "I mean, if I understand you right, the TARDIS right now has maybe one trip left, one shot to get out of the Vortex. And if we use it to go back to the Estate, we won't figure out what's wrong with her. And if that happens, the other you stays human. If that happens, what happens to you, this you?"

The Doctor didn't answer.

"Yeah, that's what I thought," Mickey continued. "So I say let's get this sorted while we still have the chance."

"I have to remind you that the next place we're going is 1912. If this doesn't work, you'll be stuck there," the Doctor warned. "I won't be able to get you back."

"Then the sooner we get started, the sooner we get this sorted, and the sooner you get me back."

The Doctor stared at him with an odd combination of amazement, shock, and gratitude written across his face. His mouth opened and closed several times, as if he was trying to talk but couldn't come up with words. Then he began to smile, a small, proud smile that slowly grew to a wide, delighted grin.

"Mickey Smith, you have made me speechless, something that very few in my life have ever been able to do." He whirled back to face the console. He raced around it, pressing buttons, flipping switches, and spinning dials. "Right!" he said as he pulled down a large lever. "Let's get this sorted!"

~oOo~

Rose slowly awoke, gradually returning to consciousness. _Warm_ , she thought contentedly. She shifted her shoulders to snuggle more deeply under the blanket that lay over her and tried to fall back to sleep. She was completely comfortable despite being in an awkward position, mostly face down on her belly with her head and chest arched slightly backwards and upwards. Her hips and legs were twisted sideways and felt jammed into a narrow space while something heavy lay sideways across the middle of her back. Her right arm was tightly wrapped around something, like she was hugging a pillow. A hard, warm, _breathing_ pillow that was quietly snoring.

Her eyes flew open. John was stretched out the sofa with his head on the armrest, and she was half on top of him, tucked firmly under his arm and with her legs stuck between his and the back of the sofa. One of them at some point must have pulled the blanket up to cover them both. She scanned her memory of the past night, or actually early morning. Rita and Chuck. Tea. Acupressure to relieve her aching back and head. A hug that turned into a snuggle that must have turned into falling asleep.

That was… new. Although the Doctor had never had much concept of personal space where she was concerned, particularly after his regeneration, he had limited his contact with her to exuberant hugs, occasionally putting an arm around her shoulders, and a single, chaste kiss in Ancient Rome.

They had certainly never had a full body snuggle on the sofa to the point of both of them falling asleep.

She was torn. On the one hand she knew she should get up. Despite his current situation, John was the Doctor, and she was certain that had he been in full possession of his memories, the Doctor would never have allowed himself to cross over that line that he had carefully drawn between them, the one that would change them from being best friends into something more. And she was sure that a snuggle like this was perilously close to crossing the line for him.

On the other hand, John was the Doctor, even if he didn't know it, and she had been in love with him practically since they had met. And he was holding her in a way she had always longed to be held by him.

She closed her eyes and enjoyed the feel of his soft t-shirt under her cheek and the comforting weight of his arm around her while within her she debated the ideas of getting up and staying put. After the internal debate had gone on far too long, she finally decided to get up, but not due to any highly principled, unselfish motives. The deciding factor was that she now desperately needed to use the toilet.

She began to squirm out from under his arm, trying not to wake him up in the process, and his grip on her tightened, holding her in place.

"Mmm." The sound reverberated deep in his chest, and she froze. After a moment she realized he hadn't woken up, and she slipped out from under his arm and carefully climbed over him. As she tried to get off the sofa, she got tangled in the blanket and landed on the floor with a loud thud. She winced at the sound, but to her relief he didn't wake up.

She covered him up again and then headed to the bathroom. After doing what was necessary, and discovering that toothpaste on her index finger didn't work as well as a toothbrush but would work in a pinch, she headed into the tiny kitchen. The tea and a small covered bowl of sugar were on the counter, along with a partial loaf of bread and a couple of bananas. There was no coffee maker, but there was an electric kettle and a toaster.

She filled the kettle and turned it on before rummaging for something to make to breakfast.

There was almost nothing in the fridge: a little milk, a little butter, some beer, a couple of half empty takeaway containers. Then she turned to the cupboards.

As she had expected, there was almost nothing in them. A few ancient pots and pans. Some cutlery. A set of four plates, four bowls, four glasses and two mugs, most of which were chipped and none of which matched. For a moment she wondered why there were only two mugs and then remembered there were two more in the living room.

She pulled the mugs out and placed tea bags in them before continuing her search of the cupboards. In the last one were several tins of tuna. She cocked her head and her brow furrowed in puzzlement. There was nothing else. Just tuna.

She didn't think the Doctor even liked tuna. Well, obviously John did.

Well, there weren't any eggs and there wasn't any jam, but there was bread and butter. So buttered toast, she thought. She put bread in the toaster and took the butter out of the fridge.

The water in the kettle began to boil, so she turned back to it to make the tea… and almost jumped out of her skin. There was a small black cat sitting in the sink.

"Now, I know you weren't there before," she said. "Where did you even come from?"

The cat blinked at her.

She ran a hand along the cat's head and received a loud purr in a response. "Well, you certainly are a pretty boy." She tilted her head, considering. "Or girl. Whatever you are, I'll bet you're hungry."

She opened a tin of the tuna, dumped it in a bowl, and placed it on the floor along with a bowl of water. The cat immediately jumped down and began to eat, continuing to purr loudly.

"You know you're not supposed to talk with your mouth full," Rose mock-scolded as she poured the water from the kettle into the mugs. She frowned. "Although I suppose purring doesn't really count, does it? How do you do that anyway?"

"Some people think they use their vocal folds and the muscles of the larynx to make the glottis resonate back and forth while they breathe in and out."

She glanced at the door. John stood in the doorway to the kitchen holding the two missing mugs. He had a small smile on his face.

"I actually meant how do cats do that and eat at the same time," she told him.

"Ah. Well, that I don't know."

"You have a cat," she said.

"No, I don't," he answered.

"Really? Then what's that on the floor eating your tuna?"

"A cat."

She raised her eyebrows at him.

"'S not mine," he told her as he placed the mugs in the sink. "She comes and goes."

"And eats your tuna."

"You're the one feedin' it to her."

"And you're the one who bought it. For her, yeah? She's here and you're feedin' her. That makes her your cat," she said teasingly.

The toast popped up in the toaster. John put it on a couple of plates and began to butter it. "Just because someone's in my flat doesn't make her mine."

She stopped breathing and stared at him, wondering if he was still talking about the cat. He didn't look at her, seemingly intent on what he was doing. "Maybe in this case it does," she said under her breath before she could stop herself. He froze.

Damn, he had heard her.

"Uh, so, what's her name?" she asked lightly, trying to change the subject and unable to think of anything better to say.

"Doesn't have one so far as I know."

"So what do you call her?"

"I don't call her anything."

"Well, you've got to call her something," she said.

He raised an eyebrow. "Why?"

"Because you do."

"Alright, what about 'the cat'?"

"Seriously? 'The cat.'"

"Why not? What's wrong with calling the cat 'cat'?" he asked.

As smoothly as if it had been choreographed, they picked up their plates and mugs and returned to the lounge.

"What's wrong with a normal name? Like Blackie or Midnight or Fluffy or something?"

John snorted as he sat down on the sofa. Rose sat down next to him.

"'Fluffy'?" he said incredulously. ""What kind of name's 'Fluffy'? Besides, the cat's a shorthair. She's not even fluffy."

"Well, maybe not, but you've got to admit it's better than 'The Cat'."

"The cat doesn't seem to mind," he said.

The unnamed cat walked past them, headed towards the door. "Dunno about that," Rose said with a laugh. "Looks like she's leaving."

John chuckled.

As they ate, they fell into a comfortable silence. After they finished, John sat back and crossed his arms in front of his chest.

"You stayed," he said.

She bit her lip nervously, clearly uncomfortable with the turn in the conversation. "Couldn't exactly help it," she said, "being asleep 'n all."

"No, I meant after you woke up," he said. "You stayed after you woke up."

"Wasn't I supposed to?" she asked hesitantly.

"Only if you wanted to," he told her.

She smiled shyly. "I wanted to."

A grin spread across his face.

"So… when I was falling asleep, why didn't you wake me up and send me home?" she asked.

His face warmed. He looked away, suddenly unable to meet her eyes. "Well, you seemed so comfortable…"

"I was," she said, just a hint of amusement coloring her tone. "Were you?"

He looked back at her. She was giving him that smile again, the one where he could see the tip of her tongue peeking out between her teeth. She was going to be the death of him, he just knew it. Her flirting was going to kill him. Possibly literally.

But two could play at that game. He met her eyes and raised an eyebrow as his mouth twisted into a smirk. "Very comfortable. Thanks for asking."

Rose opened her mouth to respond when a loud meow startled them both. She shook her head.

"Still can't believe you've got a cat."

"She's not my cat," he said automatically. "But why can't you believe it? You got something against cats?"

"No. I like cats. We used to have one. But having a pet… it's a bit domestic, yeah? You just don't seem like the type."

He was about to ask what type that was when the cat meowed again, this time louder than the first. He frowned.

"Y'know, I've never heard her meow before, and now I've heard her do it twice."

"She probably just wants out and doesn't want to use the cat flap. Our cat did that. Would sit and meow at the door until we opened it for her."

"'S probably it," he said.

Rose started to tidy up when the cat meowed a third time. She laughed. "You'd better go and let her out. If she's anything like our cat was, she'll go on for hours." She picked up their dishes and headed into the kitchen.

John walked down the short hallway to the door. As Rose had predicted, the cat sat at the door, staring at it.

"What's wrong with you?" he asked. "You've got your own cat flap. You don't need me to open and close the door for you." As he began to let her out, he saw that there was something jammed in the cat flap, preventing it from opening. "So this is why you couldn't get out." He bent down and pulled it out. It was a rolled up piece of paper.

"You gettin' your mail here now?" he asked as he smoothed it out. He raised an eyebrow when he read the brief message on it.

_Mind yer own bizness, ya twat._

"Well, I know you didn't write this," he said to the cat. "Your spelling would be better."

~oOo~

Across the courtyard, Jackie walked up the stairwell in Bucknall House, her stomach churning and her head pounding. Her hair hurt. Her teeth hurt. She definitely shouldn't have had that last whiskey sour last night, she thought. Or probably the three before that.

As she approached the door of her flat she spotted a bright yellow scrap of paper shoved between her door and the frame. She glanced at the doors of the nearby flats. None of the others had them.

Yawning, she pulled it out. It was an advert for a local pizza place. The corners were ripped as if it had been posted somewhere else first and then roughly pulled off before being stuck in her door.

She carried inside with her, but just as she was about to throw it out she noticed there was writing on the opposite side. She turned it over and read the brief message.

_Bitch, you are ruining my life._

Jackie sighed wearily. "This could be from anybody."


	16. Chapter Fifteen

**Chapter Fifteen**

After letting the cat out, John frowned at the sheet of paper in his hand. The likeliest writers of the crude note were of course Chuck and Jimmy, both of whom he’d had run-ins with the previous day.

On the other hand, there were at least a half a dozen others on the estate who hated him enough to write the note, and that didn’t include a few customers and half his coworkers at the garage who didn’t like him either. Well, it wasn’t his job to be liked, and for the most part he didn’t care one way or the other how they felt about him. Truth be told, he didn’t like them either.

He heard Rose come out of the kitchen and he hurriedly shoved the note in his pocket. She met him by the door.

“I gotta get going,” she told him. She glanced down at herself. “I really need to change. Bananas in nightcaps is a bit much even for the estate.”

“Dunno,” he said, trying to keep a straight face. He knew he wasn’t doing a particularly good job of it. “I think it suits you, and I’ve seen people wear things around here that makes that look like formal evening wear.”

She chuckled. “Still, gotta get home before my mum does. Don’t ask.” 

He grinned. “I won’t,” he said.

She moved towards the door, and he stopped her.

“Rose, I’ve got a couple of things to do this afternoon, but… d’you wanna to do something later? We could go out, or maybe get takeaway and watch a movie?”

Her face lit up. “Yeah. Yeah, I’d like that.”

“I’ll pick you up. Which flat’s yours again?”

She hesitated for a moment, just long enough for John to wonder if she didn’t want to tell him.

“Number 48,” she said. Then she added quickly, “Where’s your mobile?” After searching the flat for a bit and finding it next to his computer, he handed it to her. She rapidly typed in her phone number. “Just call me when you’re done.”

He smiled and nodded. 

When she didn’t immediately move to open the door, an awkward pause descended. She seemed reluctant to leave, or at least seemed to be waiting for him to do something, but he wasn’t quite sure what it was. She’d just spent the better part of the night with him, albeit platonically, sort of, and then had made him breakfast. What was an appropriate way to say goodbye? Did he shake her hand? Kiss her on her forehead? His impulse was to snog her for all she was worth, but he immediately rejected that as an option. 

Before he could decide what to do, she opened the door. Impulsively he stopped her again.

“Rose.” 

Her hand still on the door knob, she turned and looked up at him. With a small smile he cupped her cheek, lowered his head to hers and gently, gently kissed her. When he pulled away, her eyes were huge. “See you later,” he told her.

She nodded dumbly and slipped out the door.

After the door had closed behind her and he knew for certain she was gone, he pulled in a deep breath and blew it out slowly. She hadn’t kissed him back. She’d even looked a bit shocked.

Maybe he’d made a mistake, read her signals wrong. He was old enough to be her father. Perhaps the age gap between them was just too much for her to handle. Maybe, despite the flirting, she just wanted to be friends with him. 

But he’d been so sure…

But she did say she wanted to go out with him that night, so maybe he hadn’t misread her, or at least not entirely. Was he moving too quickly?

Not quickly enough?

No, that didn’t make any sense, not based on her reaction.

He snorted and shook his head, amused at his train of thought. According to his ID he was forty, but around her he felt like a teenager, all pounding hearts and sweating palms. What was it about Rose Tyler that made him so nervous and unsure of himself? He didn’t feel like that around anyone else on the planet.

When she had fallen asleep on him, it had briefly crossed his mind he should wake her, but he didn’t have the heart to do so. He also considered laying her down on the sofa and allowing her to sleep while he returned to his own room. But it had felt so good having her in his arms. It had been literally the first time he had held someone like that in his memory, and more than that it had been Rose, the person he had grown to care about far more than he wanted to admit, even to himself. Before he had realized he had done it, he had pulled the blanket to cover them both and had lain back on the armrest, pulling her tightly against his chest. He had been rewarded with a soft sigh from Rose, and he had fallen asleep with a smile on his face.

But then he had woken up and she hadn’t been there. For a moment he had been scared she had left, had been uncomfortable at how the evening had ended and had snuck out without saying goodbye. He had immediately worried that he had read her signals wrong, had taken things too far by holding her in his arms as she slept. 

And then he had heard her rustling in the kitchen. And realized she had stayed. The tension he hadn’t even realized he’d been holding inside released in a rush, to be replaced with an overwhelming feeling of relief. 

What was it about Rose Tyler?

He sighed heavily, wondering how one young woman could turn his life upside down in the span of one week, and how already he couldn’t imagine his life without her in it.

~oOo~

Rose crossed the courtyard and made her way up the stairwell to her mother’s flat, barely noticing her surroundings, still in a daze over what had happened.

He had kissed her. John had kissed her.

She had been surprised, thrilled even, to wake up in his arms, but as amazing as that had been, that was nothing compared to what had just happened.

He had kissed her. He had actually kissed her. 

And not with the almost parental kiss on the forehead her first Doctor had occasionally given her, and not in exuberance as her second Doctor had done once. True, it wasn’t the snog Cassandra had given him while in control of her body, but it was a real kiss. On the lips. 

And deliberate. Intentional.

She traced her fingertips over her still tingling lips. 

Memories, forgotten, dreamlike memories of her time as Bad Wolf fought to rise to the surface. She barely remembered what had happened in the time between her looking into the Heart of the TARDIS and waking up to the Doctor regenerating, but one image had stayed with her. A vision of the Doctor, this Doctor, kissing her. It was a memory she had always discounted as false. A fantasy. No more than wishful thinking.

But this hadn’t been a fantasy. No matter how brief, this had been an actual kiss.

With a smile spreading across her face, she ran up the rest of the stairs thinking about how she couldn’t wait to see him later.

~oOo~

Jackie tiptoed down the hall, in part not to wake Rose, but mostly because any type of noise, including the sound of her footfalls on the carpet, caused her head to pound. Once in the kitchen, she looked again at the scrap of paper in her hand. It wasn’t the first time she had received a foul note like this one. To tell the truth, she’d periodically received them for more than a decade, ever since she’d truly begun to date again after Pete’s death. They tended to be from ex-boyfriends after bad breakups, or from the ex-girlfriends of whoever was her current boyfriend. Less often, they’d be from someone whom she’d turned down at the local. Occasionally, like this time, she wouldn’t know who it was from. But in all the years she’d received them, she’d always hid them from Rose.

No reason to worry her. They always came to nothing.

She crumpled up the paper and shoved it deep into the bin, underneath old magazines and kitchen scraps before starting her morning tea.

She filled the electric kettle and turned it on. Normally she made a pot of tea the old fashioned way, loose leaves in a pre-warmed pot. She prided herself that she was known on the estate for her tea—she ignored the fact that she was known for other things as well. This morning however she didn’t feel up to the trouble. She could do that later.

No, for this first cuppa, she was going to have to settle for a teabag. She retrieved a mug and the box of tea bags from the cupboard and winced again as the cupboard door closed. She put the heels of her hands to her head and rubbed her temples.

Yes, she definitely needed the tea. And a couple of paracetamol. 

As she opened a different cupboard in search of the jar of painkillers, Jackie heard the door to the flat quietly open and close. Puzzled, and wondering if her hangover extended into hearing things that weren’t there, she stuck her head out of the kitchen and cautiously looked down the hall. Her eyebrows shot up. Rose was sneaking in. That wasn’t unusual in itself, but her attire was. Usually when she snuck into the flat she wasn’t wearing a nightgown.

And she had a big smile on her face.

“And where have you been?” Jackie demanded. She winced at the loudness of her own voice, ignoring the fact that she’d only gotten home minutes earlier, and wearing what she had worn the night before to boot. “You’ve been wi’ him, haven’t you?”

Rose’s smile disappeared. “It’s not what you think,” she protested. 

“And coming home in your nighty?” Jackie said in disbelief and then winced again. “Honestly, Rose, could you be more obvious?”

Rose sighed loudly. “It’s not what it looks like.”

Jackie crossed her arms in front of her in her scolding mother stance. “‘We’re not like that, Mum.’ ‘We’re just friends, Mum.’ I’ll tell you, I’ve never come home in my nighty after a night with Bev. And not with a cat who ate the canary grin like you had when you came in.” She pursed her lips. “Well, at least his nibs is human now. If you get up the duff, at least my grandchild won’t have tentacles.”

Rose rolled her eyes. “I’m gonna go take a shower,” she said.

“Don’t use all the hot water!” Jackie called after her.

~oOo~

Once she had escaped to the relative refuge of the bathroom and away from her mother’s nagging, Rose’s grin returned. She pulled off her nightclothes, including the bananas in nightcaps nightshirt that had ironically been given to her by a later version of the same Doctor she had just left, and got into the shower. As the hot water washed over her, she closed her eyes and allowed herself to be carried away by the memory of the kiss. It had been more than just a brush of the lips. It had been soft, slow, and absolutely lovely. And over far too soon. She would have loved it to have been longer, but she had been so surprised by it that it had been over before she could respond.

And she was kicking herself over that, because she was sure that had she reacted more quickly, or at all actually, it would have turned into a proper snog.

But it was fantastic just the same.

After her shower, wearing a large, pink bath towel with another, smaller towel tightly wrapped around her hair, she went to her room to get dressed, still thinking about the extraordinary kiss. 

Only the sight of her room brought her back to reality. The clothes she had worn the day before were lumped in a pile next to the bed, while other of her belongings from the TARDIS were scattered here and there around the room. More of her things erupted from her rucksack that she had dropped in the corner of her room a week earlier. 

Part of the mess was simply a function of her personality and the way she had been brought up. Her mother had never been particularly concerned about neatness. Oh, the dishes were always washed, the laundry was always done, and the carpet was hoovered regularly. But the clean dishes sat next to the sink in the kitchen, never seeming to make their way into the cupboards. Fashion magazines and romance novels competed for space with the post on the tables and chairs in the lounge while folded laundry was stacked haphazardly on any available surface in the flat. 

Jackie’s lackadaisical attitude towards order had been passed on to her daughter. Rose had always felt she had better things to do than tidy up her room. She wasn’t bothered by it, telling herself that compared to her mother and Mickey, she was the very definition of organization.

The only time she even made an effort to be tidy was on the TARDIS, and that was more because she knew that the Doctor liked things in order and she did it because she didn’t want him to think less of her, not out of any inner sense of neatness. 

Rose sighed. This morning her room was even more of a disaster than usual, and that was saying something. To be fair, she told herself, the condition of the room was in part due to leaving the flat in a hurry in the middle of the night. 

She rummaged through her clothes, looking for something to wear and wondering if she could get her mother to wash some of her laundry for her. After a bit of a search, she found a clean pair of jeans and a bright pink top. She pulled them on, shoved her mobile in her pocket, and then made a halfhearted effort to tidy her room, looking for dirty clothes to put in the wash. 

She straightened her duvet and began to replace her pillows at the head of her bed. As she picked up a stray pillow that had somehow landed on the floor, she spotted the cube that held the Doctor’s holographic message to her sitting on the bedside table.

With a rush Rose remembered the reason she was here in the first place, and with it she felt a twinge of guilt. She hadn’t been left on the estate to flirt with John, and she certainly hadn’t been left here to snog him. She’d been left here to make sure her first Doctor didn’t get into trouble as a human.

Unconsciously she reached up and touched the key to the TARDIS that she always wore on a chain around her neck. She had more than a sneaking suspicion that to the Doctor, a cuddle and a kiss would fall under the classification of trouble. 

The twinge of guilt grew, and she shoved the feeling aside. What was done was done, she told herself. If the Doctor ever remembered this, she’d just have to deal with the consequences, whatever they were. And from now on she’d just have to cool things down between them a bit, make sure nothing happened between them that the Doctor’d regret later.

But in the meantime, she had a job to do. After the difficulty she’d had trying to reach the Doctor on her mobile, it was obvious that the problems with the TARDIS were far worse than she had realized, far worse than just him not being able to return in ten seconds. Although the Doctor had told both her and Mickey that the TARDIS had also been affected by whatever had caused her to turn her first Doctor human, deep down she hadn’t really believed the extent of the problem. The Doctor’s magnificent, wonderful Time and Space ship was so powerful, so beyond her human understanding that she couldn’t really imagine anything really hurting her.

But now it was clear she was hurt. Badly.

If she was badly hurt, what did that mean for the Doctor and Mickey? Would they even be able to get back? 

She needed to figure out if there was something she could do to help them from here. And that involved a quick trip to the TARDIS. The one that was still here. 

She frowned. Unfortunately there was no direct way to get there. And she certainly didn’t want to take a twenty minute walk—one way—if she didn’t have to. But she was broke until she got paid by the garage, and that wouldn’t be for another week so she couldn’t take the bus.

It wasn’t a big deal, she told herself. She ran a lot further than that on a typical day with the Doctor. She was just being lazy. And if she was going to get there and get back before John was done with whatever he had to do, she had better get going.

As Rose walked out of her bedroom, she could hear the shower running. As much as she loved her mum, she was relieved because that meant she’d be able to avoid another lecture.

“Mum, I’m heading out,” she called through the closed door. “Can you do some of my laundry while I’m gone?” There was no answer.

Inwardly shrugging, she walked into the lounge to leave her mother a note.

And spotted her mum’s pocket book.

She shouldn’t, she thought. She really shouldn’t. At least not without asking.

Rose returned to the bathroom door. “Mum, can I borrow ten quid and your Oyster card? I’ll pay you back when I get paid.”

She heard her mother say something. She thought.

“Well, that _could_ have been a yes,” Rose said aloud. She swiped the card and fifteen pounds, rather than ten, out of her mother’s pocket book before quickly scribbling a note telling her she’d be back in an hour or two and heading out the door.

Taking the bus turned out not to be much quicker than walking, but it was cooler. July in London wasn’t as hot as, say, Ancient Rome had been, but the day was warm. And uncomfortably humid. And so she was grateful for the transport.

And she would pay her mum back. Really.

Rose stared unseeing out the window, memories of the morning returning unbidden as the bus made its circuitous way through Peckham.

The warm, comforting weight of John's arm around her as they lay on the sofa under a blanket.

The softness of his t-shirt under her cheek.

His even softer lips on hers.

They were memories that would fuel her fantasies for months, if not longer.

Her thoughts took a decidedly naughty turn as she imagined his soft lips trailing down her throat, moving ever lower…

Rose shook off the fantasy as the bus neared her stop. She shouldn’t be thinking about him like that. Nothing good could come of it, particularly after the Doctor and Mickey returned. Instead she should be thinking about what she’d do when she got to the TARDIS.

Her stop was a block away from the TARDIS, and as she got off the bus she got a nervous feeling in the pit of her stomach, one that grew the closer she got to the alley where she was parked.

What if the TARDIS didn’t open for her?

What if she did? 

If she managed to get inside, then what? She couldn’t repair her. Maybe she could use the phone to call the Doctor and Mickey in the TARDIS in her proper time stream. 

Would that even work?

Well, at the very least she’d be able to get the watch that held the Doctor’s consciousness back, she told herself. But how would that help? She wasn’t supposed to open it unless there was an emergency, and certainly there was no emergency right now. Or at least she didn’t think so. Would she even know what constituted an emergency in the Doctor’s mind? Short of a full out alien invasion or John being on the verge of death, she wasn’t sure what one would be.

Rose rounded the corner of the alley—and there she was. The TARDIS. She closed the distance between herself and the Doctor’s magnificent Time and Space ship at a jog.

“I missed you,” Rose whispered when she reached her, and it wasn’t until that moment that she realized how much. She’d known for a long time that she no longer belonged on the estate, that the TARDIS was her home and would be her home for as long as the Doctor let her stay. She missed the Doctor, she missed traveling in the TARDIS, but she also missed the ship herself. She teased the Doctor about stroking random bits of the TARDIS, but now she did it herself, rubbing her hand over the ridges on the door.

“How you doin’, girl?” she asked. She moved her hand to one of the side ridges. “Feelin’ any better? Sorry I haven’t been by to visit.” She frowned as something occurred to her. “Do you even know who I am? I’m Rose, Rose Tyler, and I travel with you, or at least I will.”

To her surprise, Rose felt a wave of warmth, something she interpreted as recognition, emanating from the TARDIS. She’d only rarely been able to feel anything from the TARDIS, and only since she’d looked into her Heart. That hadn’t happened for this TARDIS yet though, so she couldn’t understand why she’d feel anything. 

But that wasn’t important. What was important was getting inside. What she’d do once there she had no idea, but with her mobile unable to reach the Doctor she knew that she had no chance of helping him or Mickey or even the TARDIS unless she was inside. 

Rose pulled her key out from under her shirt and slipped its chain over her head. She started to put the key in the lock, and then she stopped herself.

“You’re not going to shock me like you shocked the Doctor, are you?” she asked. She didn’t really expect an answer so she wasn’t surprised when she didn’t get one. 

After another moment’s hesitation, Rose cautiously put the key in the lock. 

It wouldn’t turn.

She didn’t get a shock, but the door didn’t unlock either. She tried again, this time wiggling the key in the lock while pushing and then pulling on the door, but it didn’t help. The door stayed firmly closed.

Rose let out a loud sigh of disappointment. “Damn,” she said. “Now what?” 

The TARDIS made a quiet, sickly sound that sounded a little like a queasy stomach. She patted the ship comfortingly.

“Don’t worry,” Rose said. “The Doctor’ll get this sorted. You know him. He’s brilliant. He can sort just about anything. Don’t tell him I said that though. Don’t want his head getting any bigger than it already is.” She smiled when the light on the top of the tall blue box flashed weakly, as if in agreement. 

Rose sat down on the ground and leaned back against the door while she thought.

The Doctor had said the TARDIS would lock him out while she healed herself and that that could potentially take months. It had only been a week. Hardly any time at all, really.

No. Even though she’d only been here a week, John said he’d come to in an alley—and she knew it was this alley—with no memories on New Year’s. That meant that this TARDIS had already been here over six months and still wasn’t better.

Rose ran through their arrival back at the Powell estate in her mind, from the Cloister bell ringing and their emergency landing, to watching the holographic record they’d seen of the TARDIS turning the Doctor human and forcing him out of the ship, to the Doctor’s goodbye just before he and Mickey left. Looking back, she realized that the Doctor’d been worried that the reason their TARDIS had brought them here was because the ship couldn’t heal herself at all without their help. 

She could even die. 

And of course the Doctor hadn’t said, not directly at any rate. Why couldn’t he just say things flat out? She felt a fleeting wave of anger at him—honestly, it would have been helpful to know that straight off—that was quickly replaced by worry for both him and the TARDIS.

And being stuck here there was nothing she could do. She couldn’t call the Doctor, and with the TARDIS door still locked, there was no way she could help him. She couldn’t even get the fob watch. 

And that wasn’t even the worst part. 

The worst part was that although she didn’t want the TARDIS to be hurt, and of course she didn’t want the Doctor and Mickey to be in danger, there was a tiny little selfish part of herself that had been glad when the door wouldn’t open, because it meant she’d have more time with John.


	17. Chapter Sixteen

**Chapter Sixteen**

As soon as Rose left, John got dressed in his typical work clothes: jeans, work shirt, heavy boots. He had told the truth. Despite it being Sunday, he had a bunch of things to do that afternoon.

First stop was the garage. Since he and Rose had left work so abruptly the day before, courtesy Jimmy Stone, John still had a few things to finish up before Monday morning. If nothing else, he needed to put away his tools. After yelling at his coworkers for leaving theirs lying around, he didn't want to be caught doing the same thing.

After he was done at the garage, he made his way through a list of minor repairs he needed to do around the estate. Cleaning out the drain filter of a washing machine. Replacing the washer on a leaky tap. Unclogging a stopped up toilet.

Although he occasionally had jobs to do for some of the harried single mothers on the estate—removing an entire bag's worth of marshmallows that had been shoved down a kitchen sink by a three year old was a memorable, and sticky, one—most were for the elderly of the estate who could no longer do the things for themselves and had no relatives to do for them. Helping them out sometimes meant the difference between them staying in their own flats versus being forced into a home.

Halfway down his repair list, while he was wedged under a kitchen sink fixing a broken garbage disposal for an older woman who had recently lost her husband, he realized that he missed Rose. He told himself that it was just because she'd have been a help handing him tools or holding things in place while he repaired them, but really… he just missed her company. Having her around, knowing she was nearby, brightened his day. Helped relieve the loneliness he had felt ever since waking up in that alley on New Year's. Just holding her hand grounded him.

He had it bad, a tiny voice said in the back of his head, a voice he was finding it harder and harder to ignore.

After repairing an electrical switch that had stopped working—something that could have started a fire and burned down the entire building if it hadn't been fixed—he looked at the last item on the list. Instead of a repair, there was only an address. He sighed. It was for the elderly sisters on the floor below him, Irene and Gladys. They always had a list for him as long as his arm, usually for small tasks like replacing a lightbulb or unsticking a window. He strongly suspected they only put themselves on the repair list to have him stop by for a visit. Normally he didn't mind, in fact he enjoyed the visits, but today he was anxious to get done and get ready for his date with Rose.

At that thought he stopped in his tracks.

Was it a date? He wasn't sure.

But more importantly, did Rose think it was a date? Maybe not. It was just takeaway and telly after all.

Well, whether it was a date or not, he needed to finish up and get ready.

Oh, well. At least he was likely to get a cuppa and some biscuits while he fixed everything for them. He was getting hungry.

~oOo~

While John was busy doing minor repairs all over the estate, Rose sat on the ground with her back leaning against the TARDIS, grateful for the shade of the tall buildings on either side of her. She was reluctant to leave the ship. If the Doctor, as John, had been wandering around England for the past six months, that meant the TARDIS had been alone all that time.

Did a semi-sentient Time and Space ship get lonely? She didn't know, but she feared the answer was yes.

Finally, after her back got a crick in it and her bum was sore from sitting on the rough pavement, Rose was forced to get up. She had no idea how long she'd been there, but she guessed it had been well over an hour. She stood and stretched, pushing her hands first outward and then high over her head. She both heard and felt her back crack.

"Sorry, I've got to go," she said. She rubbed her hand along the ridge of the door again. "But I'll be back soon. Promise."

The TARDIS made a weak, sickly sound, and impulsively, Rose wrapped her arms around the tall, blue box as far as they would go, again promising to be back soon. And then after a final pat on the door, she reluctantly headed out of the alley.

The street was blindingly bright compared to the relative darkness of the alley, and she squinted her eyes against the glare. She glanced backwards. The TARDIS was barely visible, parked where she was at the end of the blind alley. She felt guilty leaving her there alone, but there wasn't really anything she could do at the moment. She couldn't get inside, and it wasn't as if she could set up camp in the alley. The best she could do was to come back every day and check on her.

As she began to walk back to the bus stop, she felt a wave of nervousness and anxiety, just as she had when she had arrived there.

But no, this was different. Then she had been worried about what might happen when she got to the TARDIS, but now she knew she couldn't get in yet. And she knew that the TARDIS was okay, at least for the moment. Frequently visiting the Time ship would help her monitor the ship's condition, and she hoped it might even help her get better. Plus this felt less like worry about the TARDIS and more like an itch between her shoulder blades.

Almost like she was being watched.

She stopped and slowly turned around, scanning the street behind her. Although it was nowhere near crowded, neither was it empty. People were walking up and down the pavement, mostly in groups of two or three. Some, who looked like tourists, were stopping to look at the wares that had been placed outside some of the shop doors. Others held bags of groceries from the market on the corner or the bakery down the way. One couple was entering a pub, which looked as if it had just opened. No one seemed to be paying particular attention to her. Or any attention at all, really.

Everything looked normal. Ordinary. Boring. Typical for a Sunday afternoon.

Must be her imagination, she decided, brought on by more than a year traveling with the Doctor. After having werewolves and clockwork robots try to kill you, a little paranoia was normal. Sensible even.

The scent of chips and burgers, probably coming from one of the nearby pubs, jerked her from her thoughts. Her stomach growled loudly. The toast she had shared with John had been hours earlier. She needed to go back to the flat and get something to eat.

She turned back to head to the bus stop, only to see the bus already there.

Damn, she thought, and ran for it, waving at him to wait for her. To her relief the driver spotted her and waited, a true rarity. As she got on the bus, she pulled her mum's travel card out of her pocket and showed it to him. He nodded and she collapsed onto an empty seat, suddenly knackered.

As the bus drove down the street, she yawned. She hadn't really had much sleep the night before, not really more than a couple of hours before the business with Rita and Chuck, and then a few more afterwards on the sofa with John. As good as the sleep had been in John's arms, and it had been really, really good, it didn't make up for a complete night's worth, and the lack was catching up to her.

And she didn't like to admit it, but she was still a little sore from the business with Jimmy yesterday. Had that been only yesterday? After such an eventful few hours, it didn't seem possible that the confrontation with Jimmy had been less than a day earlier.

She shifted uncomfortably in her seat on the bus. Another dose of paracetamol when she got back to the flat maybe, she thought. But what she really needed was another back rub. What had John called it again? Accu…something or other. Acupuncture? No, that was with needles. She knew that much. But it was something like that.

Oh, yeah, acupressure!

She closed her eyes for a moment and tried to relax the bruised muscles. Her mind wandered: to fingers gently massaging the back of her head, her neck; to thumbs lightly working their way across her shoulders, down her spine; to arms wrapping around her, pulling her close, her back against his chest; to hands caressing, one sneaking under her top to cup her breast, the other dropping down, slipping beneath the waistband of her jeans, her knickers...

She forced her eyes open. No, she shouldn't go there. Hadn't she just decided that she should cool things down between them so that John wouldn't do anything the Doctor would regret later? Fantasizing about him wouldn't help, would in fact make it much more difficult to resist temptation.

In an effort to distract herself, she stared out the window. She wondered what time it was. She needed to get back and get ready for her date with John.

Her _date_ with John.

Inwardly she groaned. If she thought fantasizing about him would make it tough to resist her impulse to snog him into next week, what would a date do?

But was it a date? She wasn't sure. It was just takeaway and telly. She and the Doctor often ate takeaway and watched telly together—albeit telly from the 76th century rather than the 21st and exotic food from some planet or other instead of pizza from the place on the corner—and she wasn’t dating him.

But the real issue was did John think it was a date? She didn't know.

But they had spent a lot of time together in the last week, walked to and from work together every day, and he had taken her to a café after work yesterday. And he had even _paid_.

And she had kissed his cheek before they had fallen asleep. Together. And he had kissed her goodbye this morning. After she had made him breakfast.

Her jaw dropped as realization struck.

Oh my God, she thought, not only was it a date, but they were _already_ dating.

~oOo~

If Mickey had thought their previous landings had been difficult, they had been nothing compared to trying to land in Southampton in 1912. As the Doctor pulled the last lever to materialize them, instead of the familiar metal-on metal groan the TARDIS typically made, the room was filled with an unearthly shriek that sounded like a woman screaming in pain.

The shrieking was joined by a deafening roar as the room shuddered and quaked, tossed around by forces Mickey was certain were trying to tear it apart. The grating that made up the floor rattled, the jump seat shook violently, and tiny bits of the TARDIS's ceiling and walls began to break off. They flew around the room, creating a coral sandstorm that stung his face and hands. On the other side of the console, with eyes shut tight and mouth moving, the Doctor hung onto a grab bar that was part of one of the control panels. Although he couldn't hear him, Mickey guessed that the Doctor was whispering encouragements to the TARDIS herself, but to Mickey's eyes it almost looked like he was praying.

With that thought, a vision of his Gran passed through his mind. Mickey himself wasn't religious, but she had been. Relying on her faith, he whispered a prayer of his own.

Impossibly, the shrieking grew louder and the shaking stronger. Smoke poured from the console. It stung Mickey's eyes and made it difficult to breathe as the toll of what he now knew was the Cloister bell emanated from deep inside the ship.

And then, just as soon as Mickey was convinced that it would never end, that they would be trapped in the Vortex forever with the TARDIS disintegrating around them, with a final jolt it was all over. They were plunged into semi-darkness. The only light was provided by the faint blue-green glow of the time rotor. The smoke quickly dissipated, drawn away from some sort of unseen filtration system.

The Doctor picked himself up off the floor and ran to the console, pulling his sonic screwdriver out of his pocket at the same time.

Still shaking from the rough landing, Mickey staggered across the grating to join him at the console. "Are we there?" he asked.

The Doctor didn't answer immediately. Instead he scanned the controls with his screwdriver and examined the readings. A fleeting expression of a combination of disappointment and sadness crossed face, only to be replaced by a mask of what Mickey knew was false cheerfulness.

"Let's take a look, shall we?" He pointed his sonic at the monitor, and the screen came to life.

Mickey peered over the Doctor's shoulder.

"Another alley?" he asked.

"Appears so. Which is good, because we don't want anyone noticing us. Police Boxes didn't exist yet, and we don't want anyone, particularly past versions of me, spotting the TARDIS." He stuck his screwdriver back in his pocket and pulled out the tiny telepathic dampers he had made. He shoved them into his ears as he headed to the door. "Now we just have to see if we've arrived at the proper place and time. That's not anywhere near a certainty, not with the way the TARDIS has been acting lately." He flung open the doors and stepped outside.

Mickey swallowed nervously. If they hadn't arrived at the correct time and place, the trip would have been for nothing. And they'd probably be stuck there, if their landing was anything to judge.

"Mickey!"

At the sound of the Doctor's voice, Mickey took a deep breath and put on an air of nonchalance before following the Doctor out the door.

For an instant, Mickey thought they hadn't left Dallas. There was a bit of a nip in the air, and the alley looked almost exactly the same: brick walls, metal fire escapes, bins… But then he noticed the walls weren't quite as close together, the brick was a different color, the fire escapes were a different design, and he could smell the salty, slightly fishy smell of the sea.

"So are we…" Mickey began.

The Doctor interrupted him. "Look up," he said.

Mickey looked up… and to his shock saw the huge smokestacks of a ship towering over the top of the building.

"Bloody hell."

"Looks like we made it," the Doctor said, grinning widely.

"Those things… those things are huge!"

"Well, they didn't call it the Titanic for nothing." As they exited the alley, the Doctor continued. "At the time, it was the largest ship that had ever been built. Even during your time, it was still one of the largest ships ever built."

Mickey realized they were still at least a block or two away from the dock, and yet the Titanic still towered above everything else. The whistle blew, and he jumped at the unexpectedly loud sound. The Doctor snickered.

"I didn't expect it, that's all," Mickey said defensively, ears still ringing.

"If you're near one of the biggest ocean liners in the world, you've got to expect you're gonna hear one of the loudest whistles."

They rounded a corner and saw dozens, no, hundreds of people headed in the same general direction as they were. Most of the men wore jackets and trousers made of a rough wool, while the women wore plain, full length dresses of either brown or black. Almost all had children in tow, and everyone, children included, carried bulging rucksacks or carpet bags.

"Third class," the Doctor said quietly. "Traveling to the New World in search of a better life, carrying all their worldly possessions on their backs."

Mickey watched them for a moment, sickened by the realization that most of the people in front of him would never make it to America. Instead, they would be dead in less than a week. And there was nothing he could do about it.

No wonder the Doctor didn't want to go to fixed points like this.

But he had, Mickey remembered suddenly. Not only was the Doctor there, he was there in triplicate.

"I just thought of something," he said. "If the Titanic sinking was a fixed point and you don't like to go to fixed points, why did you come here the first time?"

"Well…" the Doctor began. And then he froze, wide-eyed.

At the look on the Doctor's face, Mickey looked around wildly. "What is it? What's goin' on?" he asked. And then he heard it. The unmistakable sound of the TARDIS materializing.

"Fantastic! We found him already!" he exclaimed. "Now we just gotta figure out why he's here, what happened, then we can fix it and go home!" He quickly headed in the direction of the sound.

The Doctor followed close behind, grabbing at his arm. "Mickey, wait!"

Glaring at him, Mickey yanked his arm out of reach. He jogged down the street, dodging people as he looked down side streets and alleys, trying to spot the dark blue of the TARDIS. He found it just as the Doctor caught up to him.

He grabbed Mickey by the lapel and pulled them both into a recessed doorway. "Shhhhhh," the Doctor whispered, holding a finger up to his lips.

Puzzled, Mickey pulled away from him and peered around the edge of the doorway. The door to the TARDIS opened, and instead of the tall man with big ears, close cropped hair and a leather jacket that he expected to see, someone else walked out. A man with shoulder length, wavy chestnut hair wearing a long, dark brown velvet coat, an intricately patterned waistcoat, and a silk cravat. He was followed by a young woman with dark blonde hair. She wore a full-length dress in some sort of pale green with a lace shawl wrapped around her shoulders. On her head sat a large green hat with a feather sticking out of it.

The man pulled a key out of one of the pockets of his coat and locked the door.

"Shall we, Charley?" the man asked as he offered her his arm. She gave him a bright, mischievous grin and placed her hand on his sleeve.

The Doctor yanked Mickey further back into the shadows as the two walked past, seemingly not noticing them hiding in the doorway.

Once they were gone, Mickey turned and stared at the Doctor. The other man was leaning against the door, his face more pale than normal.

"I don't get it," Mickey said. "Who are they?"

"The girl's name is Charlotte Pollard. Charley. And the man…" He took a deep breath and ran a hand through his hair. "Well... that was me."


	18. Chapter Seventeen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Opinions expressed by the characters in the story do not necessarily represent the opinions of the author.

**Chapter Seventeen**

As Mickey stared at the Doctor, his jaw dropped.

And then he burst out laughing.

"That… that was you?" he asked, barely able to compose himself long enough to get the words out. "That… long-haired toff in the velvet was you? Seriously?"

The Doctor raised an eyebrow. "I'm glad you find this so amusing," he said dryly.

"Oh, I do. Believe me, I do." He paused for a second, and then his eyes lit up. He quickly began to pat the pockets of his jacket. "Where's my phone? Where's my phone?" he said, more to himself than to the Doctor. "I have _got_ to get a picture. Rose is never gonna believe this."

"Stop it," the Doctor said crossly.

"Oh, no, this is way too good," Mickey told him, still snickering. "You are never gonna live this down. Long hair and velvet? I am never gonna let this go."

"I thought I looked rather handsome at the time," the Doctor said.

Mickey made a rude noise as he stuck his hands in his trouser pockets, still searching for his mobile. "You thought wrong," he said. "You looked like a refugee from a Jane Austin novel. Or maybe an escapee from a mental hospital." He paused as he did a final search of his pockets. "Damn. I musta forgot my mobile in the TARDIS. I really, really wanted to get a picture." He sighed. "Just as well. Don't want to remind Rose…"

"Of what?" the Doctor asked, puzzled.

"Of how many women came before her," Mickey said pointedly. "How she's just the latest in a long line. And how much you have a thing for blondes."

"I do not have 'a thing' for blondes," the Doctor said, irritation creeping into his voice.

"Sure seems like it," Mickey countered, intentionally goading him. "Rose, Reinette, that girl…"

"Charley," the Doctor interjected.

"Yeah, Charley," Mickey said. "But then Sarah Jane was a brunette, so maybe it's not just blondes."

"Drop it," the Doctor said coldly.

"Yeah, I'll drop it… if you tell me one thing," Mickey said. "That girl, Charley, you two seemed awfully cozy there when you came out of the TARDIS. You care about her like you do Rose?"

"Of course I cared about Charley," the Doctor said. "But not…" His voice trailed off as he looked down the street in the direction his younger self and his companion had gone.

For a moment they were both silent. In the distance were the sounds of the sea, the ship, and the people that were gathering to board her.

Finally the Doctor took a deep breath. "Well, there's no point in just standing here," he said crisply, as if the previous conversation hadn't even taken place. "Let's get going."

He strode off down the narrow street. Mickey had to jog to catch up.

"So what's the plan?" he asked.

"Same as before," the Doctor said, suddenly coming to a stop. In front of them, the street was still filled with people headed towards the dock. He scanned the crowd. "We need to figure out what my last self was doing and what could have made both him and the TARDIS sick while trying not to be spotted by both him and my other self. The one you just saw."

"Do you remember which way you went the first time you were here?"

The Doctor shook his head. "No," he admitted.

"Makes it a bit harder to avoid them both."

"Yep."

Mickey frowned. "I just remembered something. You never told me what you were doing here the first time."

The Doctor nodded in the direction of the ship. "Charley lost some relatives on the ship. A distant cousin of her mother, her husband, and their children, a boy and a girl. Charlie and I were here trying to figure out if there was any way we could save them."

"I thought you said the Titanic sinking was a fixed point."

"It was. Is. And the deaths of a number of the people onboard as well. But it wasn't a fixed point for everyone, including her family. While we were here, we tried to convince people to postpone their trip. We managed to persuade a few people not to board her, but not many."

"Knowing you, I'm guessing that most people just thought you were a nutter."

The Doctor laughed ruefully. "Something like that."

"So, what happened to her family?"

"Charley and I won't find them until late afternoon tomorrow."

"Tomorrow? But the ship leaves…"

"Today at noon."

"So they never got on the ship after all?" Mickey asked.

"No, they did," the Doctor told him.

"But if they were onboard, and you found them…"

"Yep. We were onboard as well."

Mickey stared at him in disbelief. "You were on the Titanic?"

"Yep."

"Wow," he said. "How'd you get on?"

"Psychic paper. Gets me in everywhere. Well, almost everywhere. There was that one place on Mangelonium—"

Mickey interrupted him. "So were you able to save them?"

"No," the Doctor answered. "And believe me, we tried. They were from a poor branch of the family, and they wanted to go to America because they'd heard a rumor you could make a fortune in New York overnight. Wasn't true, but it was a common belief at the time. Anyway, they were in third class. Steerage. After the crash, we were on the way up to the boat deck when one of the children got separated from us. By the time we found him, the lifeboats were already gone. I lost track of them all once we were in the water…"

Almost as one, they joined the line of people headed for the ship. As they walked, they both continued to scan the crowd for either of the Doctor's previous selves.

"Anyway," he continued, stretching out the word. "I eventually got picked up by a rescue boat. That's when I found out Charley had managed to make her way to one of the lifeboats and had been rescued as well. But not her family."

"Wow," Mickey said, shaking his head. He paused for a moment thoughtfully. "I always wondered…the crash, was it anything like it was in the movie?"

"Yeah. Although Hollywood took a lot of liberties with the story, it was a lot closer to reality than you'd think," the Doctor answered.

"How'd you manage to survive?" Mickey asked incredulously.

"Time Lord," the Doctor said. "Respiratory bypass, so I was able to hold my breath longer than a human. Cooler core temperature as well, so the icy water wasn't as much a shock to my system. Still cold though. Ended up hanging onto an iceberg. Never been so cold in my life. It was even colder than the time I'd been buried in an avalanche in the Himalayas."

Mickey stared at him. As usually happened with the Doctor, he was totally lost at the turn in the conversation, and he wondered what he should ask about first. "What the hell's a respiratory bypass?" he asked finally. When the Doctor opened his mouth to explain, he immediately regretted it. He held up a hand. "Never mind. I'm not sure I want to know. In fact, I'm sure I _don't_ want to know."

They both watched the people for another minute as they looked for either of the other Doctors or Charley. "So which way?"

"I have no idea," the Doctor said. "Since I don't know what I was doing here, I don't know where to even start looking."

"I had a thought about that," Mickey said. "If that other you and Charley were here to try and save her family's lives, maybe you were here to try and give it another shot."

"Do you have any idea how dangerous that would be?" The Doctor's voice rose almost an octave as he spoke. "It was risky coming here the first time. There's no way I'd…" As his voice trailed off, he rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Would I?" He grimaced and his hand moved to his forehead. "Of course I would. Particularly that me. Of all the stupid, idiotic…" He let out a growl of exasperation. "There are literally thousands of people here: the crew, the passengers, the people seeing them off…" He paused thoughtfully. "If that's why he's here, that should make it easier to find him. He'll remember where Charley and I had searched, so he'll know where they aren't."

They weaved their way through the masses of people and slowly made their way down to the dock. While they walked, the Doctor began a running commentary as he pointed out the sights: the White Star Line terminal and the gangway that led from the building to one of the upper decks; the lower gangplanks that were the second and third class entrances; the crane that was loading cargo onto the ship; the reporters, photographers, even a film crew, that were capturing the historic moment of the Titanic's maiden voyage.

Mickey barely paid attention to him as he took in just how enormous the ship was. It was probably three times the length of a football pitch, and the huge red and black funnels towered above the rest of the ship, stretching high into the sky.

"They arrived by train, as did most of the other passengers," the Doctor said. "And the train's still here. So they have to be here somewhere. Unfortunately, the third class passengers are scheduled to get on first."

"'S like tryin' to find someone at a footie match," Mickey said as he scanned the crowd. If he had thought there were people from all walks of life in Dallas, that was nothing compared to here. He spotted people in finery, the men in top hats and tails, the women in silk gowns trimmed in lace and wearing elaborate hats. They were followed by others whose their clothes indicated they were maids or valets. Obviously first class accompanied by their servants. There were people similarly dressed to the people they had seen before, in garments made of rough wool, carrying rucksacks, the men in caps, the women with scarves, simple hats, or nothing at all on their heads. Third class, he now knew. And then there were the people who were dressed somewhat in between, not in silk and not in rough wool, the men in ordinary suits and bowlers, the women in dresses and hats far simpler than those from first class, but far nicer than those in third. Second class.

It was amazing how much he could tell about the people here from the way they were dressed.

After several moments searching the crowd, he shook his head. "This is going to be impossible."

"People are queueing up, but they don't seem to be letting the passengers onboard yet," the Doctor said. With another look around, he shook his head. "It's too crowded. We'll have to split up."

"But I don't know what they look like," Mickey protested.

"But you know what I look like," the Doctor reminded him. "Don't forget, although he may be looking for Charley's family, it's me you're looking for, not them." He frowned thoughtfully. "Alright, if they haven't boarded yet, the likeliest place they'd be right now is in the inspection queue."

"Inspection queue? Is that like checking passports or something?" Mickey asked.

The Doctor shook his head. "No. The third class passengers would be inspected for lice before they were allowed to board the ship."

Mickey pulled a face. "Lice?"

"Well, primarily lice, but there were a whole host of other things they'd look for. Fleas, signs of illness… Technically, they were supposed to search everyone, but in actuality they only searched third class," he said. "The first time I was here I had forgotten about the inspection queue. By the time I remembered and we searched the queue, they had already been through it and were on board."

The Doctor looked around for a moment. "You head that way, and after I look around here, I'll head the other direction. If you find him, watch to see what he does. Without letting him see you. If you don't find him, meet me back at the TARDIS at one o'clock. By that time the ship should have set sail and he should be gone."

"Right," Mickey said. He headed off up the dock the way they had come.

After he left, the Doctor walked through the crowd and scanned the area around him, looking for a glimpse of closely cropped hair or a leather jacket. It was odd, looking for himself this way. He knew he'd recognize himself head on, after all he'd shaved that face for at least a year, but he rarely saw himself from the back. But most of the men around him were several inches shorter than he was, and almost all wore hats of one type or another. Spotting a tall man with short hair, bareheaded and wearing a leather jacket, should be a piece of cake.

The honk of a horn startled him. A Rolls-Royce had pulled directly onto the dock. He backed out of the way as it parked. A chauffeur got out from behind the wheel.

"Doctor, where are you?" a female voice called behind him.

He automatically spun towards the voice… and bumped into Charley. His eyes widened. Not good. If she was here, no doubt his younger self was close behind. However, instead of a strategic retreat, he remained where he was.

He couldn't prevent a broad grin spreading across his face.

"Sorry," they said in unison and then laughed.

"No, I'm sorry," she said, raising her voice to be heard over the crowd. "I was looking for my friend and wasn't watching where I was going. He's around here somewhere…" She looked around herself for a second before turning back to him. "I'm Charley, by the way. Charley Pollard."

"John," the Doctor replied.

"Pleasure to meet you, John," she said. "So, do you have tickets, or are you here for the chaos?"

He chuckled. "Just the chaos," he said. "I'm a reporter with the London Times, covering the Titanic's maiden voyage. How about you?"

"Oh, we're here to see some friends off," she said, looking around as she answered. "But we're having a difficult time finding them. It's a bit of a madhouse right now."

"That's the understatement of the year," he said.

"Not really," she said cryptically.

Before he could respond, a familiar voice called for her from somewhere deep within the crowd.

"Charley? Charley, where are you?"

"Over here!" Charley yelled back.

"Looks like you found your friend," the Doctor said.

"And thank God for that," she said expressively. "It's hard to keep track of him. He does have a tendency to wander off. He gets into more trouble that way."

The Doctor tried to hide an amused snort.

"Charley?" the younger Doctor called again.

"Sorry," she apologized before turning towards the sound of her name. "Over here! I'm over here!"

The younger Doctor broke through the crowd. "Charley, where did you go?" he asked. "I turned around and you weren't there."

"I didn't go anywhere," she told him. "I've been here the whole time."

"Did you find them?"

"Not yet," she said. "Doctor, I'd like you to meet… where did he go?"

"The man you were talking to? He headed off in that direction."

"Huh, I wonder why he left so quickly," Charley said.

"Who was he? He looked kind of odd," the younger Doctor said.

"In what way? I didn't notice anything."

"From what I could see he was dressed a little strangely for the period."

She laughed. "You should talk!"

"What do you mean? What's wrong with what I'm wearing?"

"Nothing… except that it's fifty years out of date!"

As the Doctor watched from his position behind the car, his younger self and Charley moved out of earshot. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly as he tried to get in control of his emotions.

He had cared deeply for Charley. Seeing her from a distance had been hard enough, but talking to her, hearing her voice...

But while he lost sight of them in the crowd, it wasn't Charley that he was thinking about. It wasn't Charley he was missing.

It was Rose.

Whatever he had felt for Charley so many years ago, no matter how you wanted to label it, it was a completely different emotion than what he felt for Rose, and seeing his younger self with Charley had just served to emphasize how Rose's hand wasn't in his.

Her absence cut like a knife. He missed her so much. It had only been a day since he had last seen her, and he missed her so, so much. The fact that she wasn't with him just felt wrong.

And it was his fault.

He was the one who had left her behind after all. For a very good reason, he reminded himself. And if the TARDIS stopped working entirely, she was better off where she was, on the estate with her mother rather than stuck in 1912.

But even though leaving her on the estate had been for a very good reason and was probably for the best, it still meant she wasn't with him holding his hand.

A small, insecure part of himself wondered if she ever would be again, even if they did get back. As Mickey had reminded him repeatedly, with the business on the spaceship, the business with Reinette, he had hurt her. Badly. By his thoughtlessness and by his actions, he had hurt the woman he…

Damn it, why couldn't he say it? Why couldn't he tell her how he felt? Why couldn't he even say it to himself?

For God's sake, even a Dalek had been able to articulate it. Why couldn't he?

He sighed in resignation, and with his hands plunged in his pockets, he walked down the dock, searching for himself. And for anything that could have made either himself or the TARDIS sick.


	19. Chapter Eighteen

**Chapter Eighteen**

With nothing else to occupy her mind on the bus trip home, Rose's thoughts returned to the events of the past few weeks. Her memories flitted from one to another, seemingly with no rhyme or reason.

Arriving back on the estate. Seeing her first Doctor again, only for him not to remember her. And be human to boot.

Her second Doctor, leaving both her and Mickey on the spaceship right after he said he'd never leave her.

How terrified she'd been when they'd been left, abandoned, on the spaceship by her second Doctor.

Reinette.

Feeling lied to.

The TARDIS being sick.

Seeing that piece of shit Jimmy Stone again.

Her second Doctor leaving her here and taking off with Mickey.

Working. At a real job, not just as a lunch lady during an adventure.

Seeing her first Doctor again.

Worrying about her second Doctor and Mickey, as they tried to find out what was wrong with the TARDIS. And him.

Not being able to reach the Doctor on her mobile.

The TARDIS being sick.

Missing her second Doctor.

Seeing her first Doctor again, after being sure she'd never see him again.

Holding his hand.

Having a cuddle.

Kissing him.

Oh Lord, kissing him…

Lost in her thoughts, Rose almost missed her stop. When she realized where they were, she jumped up and rushed down the aisle. As she descended the stairs, someone was already getting on. They crashed into each other.

"Oh my God. Rose?"

Rose stared at the short, dark-haired girl in front of her.

"Shareen?"

Shareen pulled her into a tight hug. Then she let go of her and slugged her in the arm.

"Ow," Rose complained.

"That was for not telling me you were back!" Shareen said.

"Oi! Are you coming or going?" the bus driver asked.

"Coming," Shareen said firmly. She flashed her travel card at the driver and then pulled Rose towards the back of the bus.

She sat down on an empty seat and yanked Rose down to sit next to her. "Why didn't you tell me you were back?" she demanded.

"Sorry," Rose said sheepishly. "But I haven't been back all that long. Only one week is all. And since then I've been busy."

"Too busy to call your best friend?"

"I've been workin' every day this week."

Shareen's eyes grew huge. "You've been back one week and you already got a job? That must be an estate record. Where're you workin'?"

"The garage where Mickey used to work. So where are we goin'?" Rose asked, partially in an effort to change the subject.

Shareen named a pub they both knew on the high street. "We're meetin' Susie. We're finishin' up the last of the plans for her wedding."

"I thought her wedding was in a couple months."

"They decided to move it up," Shareen told her.

"Why?"

"You'll see."

~oOo~

"Would you like more tea, love? Or more biscuits?" Gladys asked.

John was sitting on the small sofa in the crowded lounge of Gladys and Irene's flat, a china cup filled with tea in his hand and a matching saucer precariously balanced on his knee. The room was jam packed with furniture. End tables had been placed on either side of the sofa, and two overstuffed chairs sat opposite it, with a low glass coffee table between them. There was a rocking chair, a doily covered side table next to it, the ubiquitous telly on a stand in the corner. And there were figurines everywhere, mostly of cats: cats curled up, sleeping; cats playing with balls of yarn; cats carrying kittens in their mouths. There was even one sitting on the top of a tall curio cabinet, perched as if she was reaching over to bat the occasional passerby with her paw.

"No, ta," he answered. "As much as I'd love to…"

"Oh, we know," Gladys said. "There aren't any secrets on the estate." She gave him a knowing smile. "You need to go and meet that girl you're courting, don't you? Rose Tyler, isn't it?"

He stared at her. "I'm not—"

"They don't call it courting anymore, Gladys," Irene interrupted. "People haven't used the word courting for sixty years."

"They called it courting when I was young," her sister argued.

"And you are seventy-five, dear," Irene reminded her as she patted her hand.

Gladys's eyes widened in surprise. "Am I?"

"Yes, dear." Irene turned to John. "Gladys sometimes forgets how old she is, bless her heart," she said affectionately.

"Happens to the best of us," John answered, thinking about his own situation. He couldn't remember his real name, let alone his age.

"Well, if they don't call it courting anymore, what do they call it?" Gladys asked.

"Seeing each other," Irene told her. When her sister still looked confused, she continued. "They're lovers, Gladys."

John's jaw dropped. He stared at her. "Oh, we're… we're not…"

"You aren't? Well, I wouldn't worry about it," she told him. "If you aren't yet, you will be soon." She winked at him.

"Well, then you'd better get going," Gladys said. "Because if you're going to go shag, you need a shower." She wrinkled her nose.

"We're not…"

"And you should consider a haircut. And a shave," Irene told him pointedly. "Pretty, young thing like Rose, with that grey in your beard, you look like her grandfather."

His eyebrows shot up. "Grandfather?"

"I don't know, Irene," Gladys said, appraising him. "I think he's dead sexy just the way he is. The long hair gives her something to grab onto, and you know just how good a beard can be. The things my fourth husband could do with his beard..."

John's eyes widened, and he fought a laugh from escaping. "Ladies, it's been lovely, but I think it's time for me to go."

Outside he was hit with a blast of warm, humid air. It wasn't raining, but the railing and the walkway overhead were dripping, and small puddles had formed in the courtyard where the pavement was uneven. Someone he'd done a job for today had said the forecast was for rain, and evidently he was right.

As soon as he was back in his own flat, John quickly showered and dressed. Afterwards he stared into the mirror over the sink. An old man stared back at him. Irene was right, he had a little grey in his beard. Since when did he have a beard? He certainly hadn't intended to grow one. Frowning, he ran a hand over his unshaven face. When had he last shaved? He couldn't remember.

And then there was his hair. His hair looked like it hadn't seen scissors in six months. Which made sense, because it hadn't. As a result, it was too short to be cool and too long to be trendy. Not that that mattered. He was too old to be trendy anyway. Either way, Gladys's words to the contrary, with his hair and his beard in their current states, he looked like hell. No wonder Jimmy had accused him of being Rose's grandfather.

Well, there was one way to fix that, he thought.

Ten minutes later he was sitting down in the barber shop around the corner.

"Take it all off," he said.

~oOo~

Ten minutes later, Rose and Shareen walked into the pub to find Susie MacGinnis had already arrived. Unlike the stylish clothes she usually wore, she was wearing an oversized red t-shirt and jeans. Her long ginger hair was pulled up into a high ponytail.

Somehow Susie had managed to grab the best table in the place, the one next to the window, and she had a huge plate of chips and a fizzy drink in front of her.

Her face lit up when she saw them. "Rose, when did you get back?" She stood up to greet them.

Rose's jaw dropped as she stared at her friend's baby bump. "Susie, you're… you're…"

"Yep," she said, grinning. "Five months gone." She rubbed her gently rounded belly. "A little girl, thank God. Don't know if I could handle a boy first time out."

Slowly the look of shock on Rose's face was replaced by a wide grin. "Congratulations!" She wrapped Susie in a big hug. "So is that why the wedding's been moved up?" she asked as she let go and they all sat down.

"Yeah," Susie said. "I still want to be able to wear my wedding dress. I tried it on yesterday and I could barely fit into it. And that's after they let it out as far as they could without adding more material. So we decided to move the wedding." She moved her hand to her swollen belly. "Besides, this one's not gonna get any smaller. I don't want to walk down the aisle looking like a hippo. Or I should say, any more like a hippo than I already do."

"You're gonna be gorgeous no matter what," Shareen said. "And Rob's gonna think so too."

"You're just sayin' that because you're my maid of honor," Susie said.

"Nah, I don't like you enough to lie to you," Shareen told her seriously, and then burst out laughing.

Susie stuck her tongue out her.

The door to the pub opened and Rita walked in. Her left eye was almost swollen shut, and makeup did nothing to disguise the large bruise on the left side of her face. Shareen and Susie didn't bother to ask what had happened.

"Oh my God, Rita," Susie said, wincing in sympathy.

Shareen, on the other hand, was disgusted. "I hope you kicked that piece of shit in the balls."

"How are you doing?" Rose asked.

"Better than last night," Rita answered. She turned to the others. "Rose's friend John chased Chuck off, then Joe stayed with me. I'm movin' into his place for a week or so until I can find someplace else to go. We moved my stuff over there first thing this morning."

"I thought you said your brother's place was too small," Rose said.

"It's better than where I was," Rita stated. "And me stayin' with Joe, that's only between us, yeah? Only you three know, outside my family. I don't want Chuck findin' out where I am."

They all nodded, and then something occurred to Rose.

"How'd you know John was my friend?"

"Seriously?" Rita asked. "First, there was the way you were actin' with each other last night. Then there was the fact you went home with him. And third, do you even remember where you live? You know how the estate is. Everyone knew you two were seein' each other, probably even before you did."

"Rose went home with someone?" Shareen asked her, and then slugged Rose in the shoulder again. "Why didn't you tell me? First you get home and you don't tell me, then you get a job and you don't tell me, and now you're seein' someone and you don't tell me!" She slugged Rose a third time and then sat back in her chair and scowled at her.

"I said sorry!" Rose protested. "And I'm not seein' John. Not really." She turned to Rita. "And how'd you know I went home with him?"

"Seriously?" Rita asked again. "First rule of the estate is there are no secrets on the estate. Plus I understand you snuck home in your nighty."

"How'd you find out about that?" Rose asked incredulously.

Rita began ticking things off on her fingers. "Your mum called Bev, Bev called Rhonda, Rhonda told Beth at the market, and then Beth told Joe's girlfriend Julie. Julie told Joe, who didn't care one way or the other but told me anyway."

Elbows on the table, Rose dropped her head in her hands. How could she have forgotten how gossipy the estate could be?

"Whatever happened to the Doctor?" Shareen asked.

"Who's the Doctor?" Susie asked.

"The bloke Rose has been travelin' with for the last couple of years," Shareen answered. She turned back to Rose. "I thought the two of you were together."

"The Doctor and I weren't like that," Rose told her.

"Seriously?"

"Seriously."

"Not even once? Neither of you headed to the bathroom half asleep in the middle of the night and ended up in the wrong bedroom?"

Rose laughed and shook her head. "Nope. Not even once."

"What is he, gay or something?" Shareen asked.

An image of Reinette crossed Rose's mind. "Nope, not gay."

"Is he really, really ugly, then?" Susie asked. "Because I'd think that after two years even Rita's brother Joe would look good after a couple of drinks."

"Oi!" Rita protested.

"I never met the Doctor, but Keisha did. According to her, he was a looker," Shareen said. "A bit odd, but tall and well fit is what she said."

"Where is Keisha anyway?" Rose asked, trying to change the subject.

"She and her brother went travelin'," Shareen told her.

"They were gonna be back well before the wedding—" Susie said.

"Until the wedding got moved up," Shareen said teasingly. "Are you sure you don't have twins in there?"

"Oh, God, don't even joke about that!"

"I'll go order for the rest of us," Rose volunteered, and when she came back they were still talking about the wedding and the baby. To her relief conversation never returned to her, the Doctor, or John. Because she didn't know what she'd do if any of them ever figured out John was the Doctor.

~oOo~

Back in his flat after his visit to the barber, John stared in the mirror in his bathroom again, surveying his newly shaved face and closely cropped hair. He frowned. He had a daft face, he decided, with a large nose, a receding hairline, a mole on his cheek, and overly large ears.

He ran a hand over his head. It felt odd to have almost all his hair gone, but it felt somehow right at the same time, almost like he felt more like himself in some way he couldn't put his finger on. He certainly felt cooler, which was a distinct advantage in July. Having it gone made him look younger as well. He thought. He hoped.

Too bad the lack of hair emphasized how large his ears were.

Oh well. Nothing to be done about that.

He glanced at the clock. Half four. Was that too early to call her?

Maybe, but he decided that he didn't care.

He pulled out his mobile and pressed speed dial.

_"The party you are trying to reach is unavailable. If you would like to leave a message—"_

He frowned again. She told him to ring her when he was done. He dialed again.

_"The party you are trying to reach is unavailable. If you would like to leave a message—"_

"Huh."

Maybe her phone was turned off for some reason. After thinking a moment, he decided to pick her up at her flat. After all, she had agreed to come over. If she had changed her mind, he'd just come home.

A tiny part of him, a part that he tried to ignore, desperately hoped she hadn't changed her mind.

Remembering that it had been raining earlier, he grabbed a jumper from his bedroom. He pulled it on over his head as he walked out the door.

Once outside, he crossed the courtyard and climbed the stairs of Bucknall House. Number 48, she said. Once he got to the door to her flat, he looked around, puzzled. It seemed familiar for some reason.

He knocked on the door, and after a moment he heard someone coming to answer it.

"Did you forget your key again?" a female voice called.

The door was opened by a woman wearing a powder blue track suit. Part of her bottle blonde hair was pulled up in a messy ponytail while the rest hung loosely around her face, and the heavy makeup she wore did nothing to disguise that she was about forty.

Bloody hell, it was that woman who had hit on him when he had come over to fix her tap.

Her hand flew to her mouth and eyes grew huge. "Oh my God, it's you," she said. "She said it was, but I didn't really believe it. But it is, isn't it?"

"Is Rose Tyler here?" he asked, desperately hoping he had the wrong flat.

"No," she said, and he was relieved. Until she continued. "I expected her back hours ago. I figured she was with one of you."

He stared at her. The woman was obviously completely round the bend.

"One of me?" he asked.

She slammed a hand over her mouth again. "Never mind. Forget I said that."

"Does Rose Tyler live here?" he asked.

"Oh, yeah, you wouldn't remember that, would you?" she said. "Yeah, she lives here."

"So who are you?" He realized it came out sounding like an accusation, even to his own ears, but then the whole conversation was making him feel a little off balanced.

"I'm her mum," she snapped.

He sighed. He'd been afraid of that. "Can I come in?"

"Oh. Oh, yeah."

She stepped away from the doorway.

"I tried calling her, but I think her phone is off," he said as he entered the flat. "Either that or it needs recharging."

"Her phone is never off, and it never needs recharging. I've tried calling her for hours, just hours, all afternoon, but no answer. And she always answers, or at least rings back right away. Her not calling back hasn't happened since—well, never mind about that now. Anyway, I figured she was gone again. Although she usually says goodbye these days. Unlike the first time."

She got a strange look on her face. It almost looked like she was glaring at him, but that didn't make sense. Then again, nothing Rose's mum had said or done since he had arrived had made any sense.

"Well, sit down," she ordered as they made their way into the lounge.

He sat.

The messy, overly crowded room looked familiar, from its beat up fake leather furniture to the piles of gossip magazines and cheap romance novels piled on the coffee table to the mirror hanging on the wall. He told himself it was just because he had been here before, to repair the tap. But it felt like more than that. More like déjà vu, like there was a memory there, hidden, just out of reach. He had odd flashes of a plastic arm. And the table, but a different table, laying broken on the floor.

Weird.

He shook his head to clear the images as she sat down opposite him. An awkward silence fell between them.

"Look, I'm sorry," he said after a minute or so, "but I don't remember your name."

"My name's Jackie," she said slowly, as if she was talking to a child. "And you're the—never mind. What's your name again?"

"John," he told her, wondering if being here with her could be any more awkward than it currently was. Of course, she could proposition him again, he thought. That would definitely be more awkward.

The sound of the front door opening filtered through to the lounge. Rose, John thought, feeling a wave of relief. He stood, tamping down an irrational but almost overwhelming desire to grab her hand and shout _run_.

As Rose walked into the flat, she could hear sounds coming from the lounge. The telly, maybe, she thought, or maybe Stuart was over. "Mum, are you here?"

"Back here, Rose," Jackie called back. "Where've you been?"

"I left a note," she said.

"Well, I didn't see it," Jackie answered. "All afternoon I've been calling and calling. The Do—John said that maybe your battery went."

"John? Is he here?"

She walked into the room. And her jaw dropped as she took in the man who stood in front of her. Clean-shaven, close cropped hair, green jumper, twinkling blue eyes, and a wide grin.

It was her first Doctor.


	20. Chapter Nineteen

**Chapter Nineteen**

Rose froze in her tracks, her eyes wide with shock.

Her jaw dropped.

Her heart pounded wildly, almost painfully in her chest.

The Doctor, her first Doctor, was standing in front of her.

As she stared at him, time slowed and the world around her faded. The entire focus of her universe narrowed to the man on the other side of the room.

It was her Doctor. Her first Doctor.

The man she'd been willing to die for.

The man she'd swallowed the Time Vortex for.

The man she had first fallen in love with, the first man she had ever truly loved.

She couldn't breathe. For some reason there wasn't nearly enough air in the room.

It was her Doctor. He was minus his leather jacket to be sure, but it was him.

His smile faltered and was replaced with a look of puzzlement. At the change in his expression, her brain began to function again. She took a deep breath and forced herself not to rush across the room and fling herself into his arms.

"Rose?" he said tentatively. "Rose, are you alright?"

She flashed him a brief, nervous smile.

"Fine," she said. "I'm fine. I, uh, just need to..." She realized she couldn't think of a single thing she needed to do, so she settled for jerking her head back towards the way she came. "Be right back."

She fled the room.

Once in her bedroom, she shut the door and leaned with her back against it.

_It's not him_ , she told herself firmly. Not totally at any rate. She knew it wasn't. Nothing had changed. The watch was still locked in the TARDIS and he was still John.

It had been easy—well, not easy, but easier—to see him as John when he had longish hair, a scruffy beard, and a work shirt, but looking as he did now… how on Earth could she see him as John anymore when he looked like the Doctor?

And, oh God, if he tried to kiss her again, how the hell was she going to resist, when that was the last thing she wanted to do? Just moments ago she'd been barely able to resist throwing herself at him. And if she had been tempted to do that with her mum in the room, what would she do if she was alone with him in his flat?

She was afraid she knew what she'd do, and it involved a lot of snogging and possibly—probably—things that required a lot less clothing.

_Pull yourself together_ , she told herself. Nothing had changed. He was still John and she still had to watch over him and she still had to make sure that he didn't do anything that he'd regret when he turned back into the Doctor.

She considered her options. There seemed to only be two: stay here or go with him. And she knew which one she'd rather do. Which one she'd always want to do. Human or not, whether he realized he was the Doctor or not, she'd always want to go with him.

Well, regardless of what she did, she couldn't just hide in here. Because of course hiding was exactly what she was doing.

She took a deep, steadying breath, grabbed a jacket, and headed back out of the room.

~oOo~

In the lounge, John stared after Rose, puzzling over her odd reaction to the sight of him. Strangest reaction to a shave and a haircut he'd ever seen.

"Wonder what that was all about?" he said aloud. "'S not as if I just turned into someone else or something."

From a spot near the kitchen, Rose's mother squeaked. He turned and looked at her sharply. "I don't know what's got into her," she said to him in an unnaturally high voice.

Two thoughts ran concurrently in his mind: one, he had totally forgotten that Jackie was there, and two, by the tone of her voice he was sure Jackie knew exactly why Rose had had the reaction that she did.

Now if only he knew what it was.

Before he had time to think about it, Rose burst back into the room, now wearing a denim jacket over her t-shirt. She stared at him, biting her lip, and he stared back, suddenly as nervous as she appeared to be.

"Let's go out," they said at the same time. And then they both laughed.

"Barmy, the pair of you," Jackie said.

~oOo~

Within minutes Rose and John were on the bus. On the way to the bus stop it had been decided that John would pick where they were going. Rose hadn't even asked what he had in mind for their evening out.

"Don't you want to know where we're headed?" he asked.

She shrugged. "Figure I'll find out when we get there. I trust you."

He grinned. "Fantastic. Haven't had very many people trust me." He laughed ruefully. "Actually, I don't remember anyone trusting me, not even over what to have for tea."

She grinned back and bumped her shoulder into his. "Guess I'm just special, then," she said.

"Guess you are."

They grinned at one another.

And then she thought of something her mother had said back at the flat, something she'd missed the significance of in her shock at seeing John looking the way he did. She frowned thoughtfully.

"What?"

"I just remembered somethin'. Didn't Mum say she couldn't reach me on my mobile?"

"Yeah, she said she'd tried all afternoon. I tried too, but I couldn't reach you either."

"Huh." She pulled it out of her pocket. The screen was black. Why was it black? And it wouldn't turn on, no matter what she did. "'S not workin'," she said.

"When was the last time you charged it?"

"It never…"

She stopped herself from continuing. She couldn't tell him that she hadn't needed to recharge it in more than a year, not since the Doctor, he himself, had jiggery-pokery'd it. Her mobile was connected to the TARDIS in some way she didn't quite understand but that let her phone her mother from anywhere in time and space. A side effect of that was that it never needed recharging. But now it wasn't working.

She slipped it back in her pocket. "Yeah, that must be it. I must've forgot to recharge it. I'll have to do it when I get home."

~oOo~

After the bus ride, there was a trip on the tube to the Leicester Square station. Once back above ground, John took her hand and led her through the crowd headed to the Square.

Leicester Square was known for any number of things including restaurants and pubs, theaters and a fantastic cinema. She tried to imagine which he could be taking her to. Any of them would be wonderful. She and Mickey had rarely had the money to do more than go to the local, and it wasn't as if he'd want to go to the theater anyway.

To her surprise, once in the Square they walked right back out again. She looked around, puzzled, as she tried to figure out where they were going.

After a moment she smiled.

"We're goin' to Chinatown?" she asked.

He grinned at her, obviously pleased she'd reasoned it out. "Yeah. That alright?"

"More than alright," she said. She bumped her shoulder with his and grinned at him. "I love Chinatown, and I haven't been in ages."

His smile widened, and he squeezed her hand.

As they neared the several block area that made up London's Chinatown, Rose was bombarded with competing mouthwatering aromas that could have been coming from any one of a dozen restaurants. Her stomach growled loudly. The chips she'd had at the pub with Shareen, Susie, and Rita had been hours earlier.

"Hungry?" he asked. Although he said it with a straight face, there was amusement in his voice and she knew he had heard it.

And then his stomach growled as well, even louder than hers. She laughed.

"No more hungry than you apparently are," she teased.

"Never said I wasn't," he told her.

As they walked down the street hand in hand, Rose took in their surroundings. In many ways the street was just like any other tourist area in London. It was filled with restaurants and pubs, shops selling cheap souvenirs, and music filling the air. But it was different as well. Traditional Chinese music, rather than rock, emanated from the restaurants. Brightly colored pennants and red paper lanterns hung from wires that crisscrossed the street high overhead. In front of the shops, in addition to the typical items emblazoned with the Union Jack, were racks of hand painted scrolls, banners printed with Chinese characters, and other trinkets that were uniquely Chinese: lions and Buddhas, dragons and lots and lots of bright red pigs—which John informed her was due to it being the year of the pig in Chinese astrology.

The differences between this part of London and the rest of the city made Rose love Chinatown. It gave her the feeling that she had entered another world. Until she had met the Doctor, she had been convinced that a trip to Chinatown would be the closest she'd ever get to traveling, to experiencing another culture.

John led her to an outdoor grill that was set up in front of a small restaurant. The chef, a tiny woman who looked to be in her eighties, called out to him by name and then continued in a language Rose couldn't understand. John answered in the same language, and the woman laughed.

As they continued to talk, Rose blinked in surprise. The TARDIS had translated for her for so long it hadn't occurred to her that it would ever stop. She quickly looked around at the nearby signs and banners. Most of them were covered in Chinese characters.

She couldn't read them. The TARDIS hadn't translated them into English for her.

Before she could work out the implications of that in her mind, John gestured to her and said something. The woman smiled and bowed. Then he turned to her.

"Rose, this is Huang Le, a friend of mine."

"Nice to meet you, Mrs. Huang," she said, unsure if the elderly woman would understand.

"Le, please, love," the old woman said in only slightly accented English. "It's a pleasure to meet you as well."

John's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "Le, you've been holdin' out on me. I didn't know you could speak English."

"You never asked," she said, not hiding a smirk. She turned to Rose. "I was born and raised in Hong Kong. I've spoken English since I was a child." She winked, and Rose grinned back.

"Then why'd you always talk to me in Cantonese?" John asked.

"Because so few here speak it as well as you do, even here in Chinatown," she said. "It's lovely to be able to hear the language as it was meant to be spoken."

Le turned her attention to the grill. Not everything on it was recognizable, but Rose could make out chunks of chicken, large prawns, skewers filled with a variety of meats, and even a whole duck missing only feathers and its head.

Le carefully removed two small skewers filled from the grill, lightly brushed them with a dark brown sauce, and then held them out to him. "These are for you."

John took the skewers in one hand and reached in his pocket with the other. He pulled out a handful of coins, but she waved them off.

"No," she said. "No charge. You just promise to come back and talk to me again."

"Absolutely," he promised.

"Thank you," Rose said to Le.

"Come back anytime," Le said. "And take care of him. Keep him in line. I have a feeling he gets into a lot of trouble on his own."

John raised his eyebrows while Rose laughed. If Le only knew, she thought. "I promise," she said.

As they walked away, John handed Rose one of the skewers.

"Try this," he said.

She took a bite of the fragrant, steaming meat. "Mmm, this is gorgeous. What is it?"

"Chuanr," he told her.

"Cha…" she started, trying to wrap her mouth around the unfamiliar word.

"Chuanr," he said. "This one's pork. It's often served with a sweet bean sauce, but Le serves it with a barbeque sauce she invented."

She took another bite as they walked down the pavement. "Oh, it's so good."

The chuanr had only whetted their appetites, so after wandering around a little longer, they went into a little restaurant near the arch that marked the main entrance into Chinatown. The dining area had a dozen tiny tables crowded into the tiny space, most of which were already filled. After a quick word from John, the head waiter led them to one of the remaining available tables.

"Why didn't we go to Le's restaurant?" Rose whispered after they had been seated.

"Le's place is a buffet," he told her. "She suggested I take you here." He laughed. "Actually, she ordered me to. Said anyone willing to put up with me deserved to go someplace nice."

Laughing, Rose picked up the menu. It was printed in both Chinese and English, and again she was struck by the fact that the TARDIS wasn't translating for her. The last time that that had happened was when the Doctor had been unconscious after his regeneration. Maybe the TARDIS wasn't translating for her because the Doctor had been turned human.

But that didn't explain her mobile. If the TARDIS was so bad off that even her phone wasn't working, what did that mean for the Doctor and Mickey? She really needed to check on the TARDIS again. Tomorrow, she promised herself. Somehow she'd get back over there tomorrow.

"Rose. Rose."

She blinked as she realized John had been trying to get her attention. The waiter was standing next to their table.

"Penny for 'em," John said. "You looked like you were a million miles away."

_Farther than that_ , she thought. _Much, much farther._

"Been tryin' to figure out what to have, but I can't," she said instead. She shut the menu. "Why don't you order for the both of us."

He chuckled. "You really do trust me. That can be dangerous, Rose Tyler."

She laughed. "I'll take my chances."

He ordered, again in Chinese, and the waiter bowed and left.

"I didn't know you knew Chinese," Rose said.

"Yep. Both Mandarin and Cantonese. They aren't the same, y'know."

"No, I didn't know," she told him. "How many languages do you know?"

"Not really sure," he replied. "So far in the last six months I've discovered I know at least eleven: English, Spanish, French, German, Gaelic, Welsh, Farsi, Cantonese, Mandarin, and Hindi. I may know more than that; I don't know. The way I usually find out is if I hear someone talkin' in it. That's how I found out I know Hindi, by hearing Mudali and his wife having a bit of a domestic." He snorted. "I tried not to listen, but I couldn't help but hear them. They didn't think anyone could understand them, so they didn't even try to keep it quiet. Found out things I really didn't need to know."

Their first course arrived, a delicious hot and sour soup, and as they ate he continued.

"Anyway, I've been tryin' to figure out why I'd have learned so many languages, and I only came up with two. Either I was a soldier or some kind of diplomat. And can you imagine me a diplomat?"

She shook her head.

"Neither can I. So that leaves soldier. When you combine the languages with the martial arts and the…" He stopped abruptly.

"The what?"

He shook his head. "Nothin'. Doesn't matter."

It was clear to Rose that he didn't want to talk about whatever it was that he almost told her. It was also clear that he was bothered by the idea that he might have been a soldier. And it wasn't as if Rose could tell him that he hadn't been. Because he had been a soldier. He'd fought in a war across space and time, one that he had ended, and at the cost of his family, his people, and his planet. Knowledge of his role in the Time War still devastated the Doctor; she had no doubt it would destroy John.

Assuming he'd even believe her if she told him. He more than likely would decide she was so far round the bend that she was in another country.

But she didn't have to tell him. In fact, it was better for him that she didn't. For the first time since all of this started, she was glad that she had to keep things from him and glad he had lost his memory. The Doctor had done what he'd had to do during the Time War, but since John didn't remember, he wasn't burdened by it.

"Maybe there's another explanation," she said hesitantly. "There's probably all sorts of things you could have done. Maybe you were a linguist."

"A linguist with martial arts training? Yeah, there's a lot of call for that."

"Well, something else then. You know a lot about medicine. After all, you helped me after Jimmy hurt me. Maybe you were in the military, but not as a soldier. Maybe you were, I dunno, a medic or somethin'."

"You mean maybe I was some sort of doctor?" He scoffed. "It's a nice thought, Rose, but I highly doubt it."

The waiter appeared at their table and placed plates laden with food in front of them. It created a natural break in the conversation.

"It's called Lion's Head," John told her, gesturing at her plate filled with some sort of large, flat meatballs and vegetables in a thick, dark sauce. "The meatballs are his head, and the bok choy is supposed to be his mane."

He spent the rest of the meal lecturing her on the origins and variations of the dish in traditional Chinese cuisine, which led to a lecture on Chinese culture in general in an obvious attempt to change the subject. It was such a Doctorly thing to do. When he was faced with discussing something he didn't want to talk about, he just ignored it and talked about something else. Most of the time it drove her spare, but this time she was actually glad. The conversation had been venturing into dangerous territory.

As he spoke, her mind wandered. What had she been thinking, suggesting he'd been a medic? All she'd really wanted to do was lead him away from the thought of being a soldier.

But he'd instantly made the jump from medic to doctor. Thank God he'd discounted the idea immediately. She didn't know what she'd do if he'd figured out he was a doctor.

She'd already told him that she had traveled with someone who was called the Doctor. Because how big a jump would it be for him from thinking he was a doctor to figuring out he was _the_ Doctor?

A tiny voice inside her wondered how bad it would be if he did know.

No, she couldn't think like that. Who knew what would happen? The Doctor himself had told her it would be dangerous if he found out, both to himself and the timelines.

She'd just have to be more careful from now on. A lot more careful.

~oOo~

After they ate, it was still early so they decided to take a walk before going home. Hand in hand they wandered aimlessly down streets and across parks and squares, watching the tourists as much as looking at the sights themselves.

Eventually they found themselves on the tree-lined walkway that followed the curve of the Thames. The water flickered orange and red, reflecting the light of the setting sun. The wrought iron lampposts, set into the cement barrier that separated the pavement from the embankment itself, had just begun to glow, shedding light on the path.

Rose leaned against the barrier, looking at the majestic buildings on the opposite shore. In the distance she could see the London Eye towering over its surroundings.

"Beautiful," John said as he joined her. She looked up at him in astonishment, and he quickly looked away. He gestured in front of them. "The city, the river, it's gorgeous."

"Yeah," she agreed, but inwardly she laughed. That was so typically him. Say something nice and then immediately backtrack out of embarrassment.

While they silently watched the boats travel up and down the river, Rose's mind returned to the afternoon, and her lunch with her friends.

She looked up at John. "I just remembered," she said. "A friend of mine is getting married in a couple of weeks…"

"Well, congratulations to the happy couple," he replied.

She waved his comment off. "No, that's not it. I've been invited… and I want to know if you'll come with me. As my plus one."

"Plus one?" he asked, sounding confused.

"Yeah. You know how when you get an invitation, at the bottom they tell you you can bring a guest? So when they count how many people are gonna be there, it's the number of people they invited plus one more for each person. 'Plus one.'"

"Okay, I'll go."

"You don't have to go if you don't want to," she added hurriedly.

"Do you want me to go?"

"Well, yeah," she said.

He grinned at her. "Then yeah," he said, nodding. "Yeah, I'll be your 'plus one'."

She smiled happily. "Great! Well, that's settled then."

"Yes, it is."

He glanced over her shoulder and his smile faded. It was replaced by a look of puzzlement.

"What is it? Is there something wrong?" she asked. She turned around to see what he was looking at. In the distance, the lights on the Eye had been turned on, causing it to glow. She slowly turned back to him, eyes wide.

"What is it, John?" she asked again.

"I dunno," he said. "You know how you can look at a word and you know how it's spelled and then one day, even though it's spelled the same, it looks different somehow, like it's spelled wrong even though you know it's not?" He tore his eyes away from the sight of the giant wheel and shook his head vigorously. "Never mind. 'S probably nothing. Just a bit of déjà vu gone wrong."

"Yeah, that's probably it," she said quickly. " Y'know, it's getting late. Why don't we head home."

As they walked away, she glanced over her shoulder. Behind her, the London Eye slowly rotated, glowing in the night sky.

~oOo~

On the way back to the estate, due to the lateness of the hour as well as the fact that it was Sunday, John and Rose managed to get adjoining seats in one of the train's mostly empty carriages. As the train shook and bounced, she leaned against him. He wrapped his arm around her, pulling her into his side. They didn't say anything; there really was no need as they'd already spent most of the evening talking, and the almost deafening rattle of the train would have drowned out anything they'd say anyway.

It had been a fantastic evening, he thought, the best evening he ever remembered having. He pulled her closer and in response, she rested her head on his shoulder.

Yeah, the evening had been completely fantastic.

~oOo~

Later, they walked hand in hand from the bus stop back to the courtyard separating their buildings.

Rose looked up at him, biting her lip again, just as she had before they'd left her mum's flat.

She was adorable, he thought. Absolutely adorable.

"John, I, uh, I had a fantastic time tonight," she said. "Thank you."

"No need to thank me. I had a great time too. Listen, you wanna—"

She interrupted him. "Well, 's getting late. I'd better get home." She jerked her head at her own building, and he felt a pang of disappointment. Obviously she wasn't interested in coming up to his flat.

"Yeah, me too," he agreed, trying to sound cheerful and hoping his disappointment didn't show in his face. "Got work in the mornin' after all."

He leaned down to kiss her goodnight, but she was quicker than he was. Standing on her tiptoes, she gave him a quick kiss on the cheek and headed to her building.

From the shelter of the entrance to his own building, he watched her run up the stairs. He crossed his arms in front of his chest and frowned. He couldn't figure her out. She'd gone out with him, she'd walked hand in hand with him, she'd snuggled into his side on the train, she'd even asked him out. Yet she wouldn't let him kiss her. 

"Talk about the queen of mixed signals," he said. "And just when I thought everything was going so well."

Something brushed against his calf. He glanced downward. As he had expected, it was the cat. She sat down and stared at him. Her eyes glittered in the dim light coming from the stairwell.

"Your date end early too?" he asked.

She blinked at him.

He jerked his head at the stairs. "Come on."

Back in his flat, he automatically fed the cat before going into his bedroom. He sat down on the edge of his bed and picked up his sketchbook off the bedside table. He flipped through it. Among all the images of war in space and on alien landscapes, there were at least a dozen drawings of Rose. He smiled. Most had been done before he had met her—at least from his perspective—but several had been done since then.

He quickly sketched her again. This time it was an image of her in Chinatown holding a small ceramic pig in her hands. Once he was satisfied with the drawing, he looked at it and chuckled.

Oh, he had it bad.

Just as he was about to put the sketchbook back down, he spotted a drawing he'd forgotten about. His brow furrowed in puzzlement. It was a sketch near the middle of the book of a tall, dark box sitting next to the Thames.

And in the background of the picture, across the river from the box, was the London Eye.


	21. Chapter Twenty -- The Titanic, 10 April 1912

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was getting too long so I decided to split it into two or possibly three parts. 
> 
> Also, due to the complicated plot line and timey wimey nature of this story, I've decided to add locations and dates to the chapter titles. I'm planning on going back to add them to previous chapters over the next couple of weeks. I don't know if it will help any of you keep track of where we are in the story, but I'm hoping it will help me!

**Chapter Twenty—The Titanic, 10 April 1912**

At the end of the dock, the Doctor took a moment to look at the sea, more grey than blue due to the cloud cover. The weather was cool—no, cold—but not unusually so for April on the coast of England. The light breeze coming over the water gently blew through his hair, mussing it a bit. He ignored it. With the way he wore his hair these days, no one would notice the difference.

Well, Rose would notice—she noticed everything—but no one else would, particularly since no one but Mickey knew him here.

With a heavy sigh, he turned back to the Titanic. People were still arriving at the already crowded dock. So many people, so many with tickets for the overseas voyage. So many who wouldn’t survive. 

Knowing that, seeing so many people, so many children who were so vibrantly alive, so incredibly hopeful about the future and yet wouldn’t live through the week, made him physically ill.

He hated fixed points. There was so little he could do except watch events unfold. Usually hearts wrenching, horrific events. In the past, the Time Lords frowned upon his attempts to alter fixed points—occasionally even as they sent him to do so themselves—but it was within their power to smooth over the minor, and in some cases major, paradoxes created. But the Time Lords were gone. And fixed points were even more dangerous than they had been. If he wasn’t careful, his mere presence could cause a paradox. Particularly because he was here in triplicate.

He hadn’t even wanted to come the first time. He wouldn’t have, except that Charley had begged to come and he had caved in to her wishes. And Mickey was probably right about why he had come back here in his last form. Immediately after the Time War he’d been desperate to save anyone anywhere. Who better to save than a family he’d tried, and failed, to save before?

This time he wouldn’t have come except it was necessary, absolutely vital, if not for his own survival then for the survival of the TARDIS. She had an enormous capacity for self-healing, yet she was getting worse, not better. He had to find out what had damaged her.

He doubted whatever it was was here. Nothing human, nothing natural to the Earth had the capability to damage her to this extent. Which meant that whatever it was had to be alien. 

But if there had been something alien here, surely he would have noticed when he had been here with Charley.

Even though he doubted that whatever had happened to the TARDIS had happened here, he still had to check. There was a chance—a very, very slight chance—that he had missed something that first time. But even more than that, he didn’t know where else to look. He just plain didn’t know where else he had been during that gap in time between the first and second times he'd asked Rose to travel with him. Rose had seen pictures of him in three places: Dallas, Krakatoa, and here. If whatever had happened hadn’t happened in one of those three places… well, all of time and space was a pretty big place to have to search.

He didn’t want to think about the likelihood that the TARDIS wouldn’t be up to more searching beyond here.

Frowning, the Doctor scanned the crowd. Neither Charley nor his previous selves were in sight, and everyone around him was preoccupied with either preparing to board the ship or saying goodbye to those who were. He pulled his sonic screwdriver out of his pocket and crossed his arms, blocking it from the view of casual observers while he surreptitiously scanned the area for advanced technology. He needn’t have bothered trying to hide it. No one was paying any attention to him at all. 

He glanced down at his sonic. Nothing. There was no sign of anything more advanced than the early automobiles and primitive cameras of the period. And a scan for any sign of alien presence only revealed three versions of himself. That was both good and bad, good because he was now certain his leather wearing self was here somewhere, but bad because he still didn’t have an answer for how the TARDIS had been damaged.

With a flip of his thumb and a quiet whir of the sonic, he quickly scanned the area again. As he read the results, he grimaced in frustration. The sonic screwdriver was unable to narrow down the location of his other selves beyond the general area of the dock. 

Looking at the crowd again, he scratched the back of his neck thoughtfully, trying to decide on a course of action. He had been planning to look for his previous self, but it occurred to him that since Mickey was already looking for him, that left him the freedom to do something else.

But what?

The real issue wasn’t to find out why his previous self was here, he reminded himself. It was to find out what had happened to both his other self and the TARDIS. After all, trying to save Charley’s family wouldn’t have damaged the TARDIS.

His mind returned to the hologram he, Mickey, and Rose had watched in the console room in the TARDIS. It had showed his previous self, apparently ill, collapsing on the floor and the TARDIS using the Chameleon Arch on him. He had assumed that whatever it was that had made him ill and had damaged the TARDIS had happened immediately before his collapse, but what if it hadn’t? What if the TARDIS had been damaged earlier and it had just taken time before the symptoms began to appear? 

That made the most sense. The TARDIS had built-in safeguards that would prevent most sudden crises, but they wouldn’t necessarily prevent gradual ones. It also made sense from the standpoint that the problems his own TARDIS was experiencing were getting worse. In fact, the mere fact that his TARDIS was developing problems at all supported the idea that whatever the cause was, it had happened slowly and was becoming worse over time.

But he hadn’t seen any evidence of anything, sudden or gradual, in the playback that could have resulted in the situation they were in now. 

On the other hand, so much of the replay had been damaged… 

He raked a hand through his hair in frustration. How could he find out if he was right if he couldn’t watch the CCTV footage?

And then his jaw dropped as the answer came to him. He slammed his forehead with the heel of his hand. “Oh, I am so stupid!” he exclaimed. Instead of looking at the damaged CCTV footage in his own TARDIS, he could examine the memory banks of the TARDIS belonging to his younger, leather-wearing self. That would tell him if the TARDIS had already been damaged, and if it had, and if the damage was happening gradually over time, he might be able to retrieve enough information from the memory banks to figure out what had caused it.

And if he discovered what the cause was, he’d be able to fix it.

Probably.

After a final scan of the area, which told him nothing more than he already knew, the Doctor shoved his sonic screwdriver back into his pocket and began the long walk back up the dock, keeping an eye out for his two previous selves and Charley. 

He hadn't gone very far, only twenty yards or so, when he heard the sound of a woman's laughter ringing over the sounds of the crowd. At the same time, out of the corner of his eye he saw a flash of blonde hair. Hearts pounding, he whirled around.

It wasn’t Rose. 

Of course it wasn’t, he chided himself. How could it be? She was back in 2007 with his other self. He knew that. But just for an instant…

The blonde girl, she was almost too young to be called a woman, was only about ten feet away from him. Even from this short distance she looked remarkably like Rose, in height, in age, even in facial features (although the Doctor thought Rose was far prettier). The girl was dressed similarly to the other women on the dock—a full length pink cotton dress under a warm woolen coat, hair up and tucked neatly under a broad brimmed hat—but unlike the others she was tightly clutching a bundle of blankets to her chest. Next to her stood a slightly older man, probably her husband because he was much too young to be her father and was standing far too close to her to be a brother or a family friend. 

The Doctor chuckled. The girl's husband was tall and skinny with dark brown hair, and he was wearing a conservative brown suit. 

The girl looked down at the blankets cradled in her arms. She softly smiled, her face practically glowing with happiness.

Oh, she held more than just a bundle of blankets, he realized. She had a baby in her arms.

As she lowered her head to drop a kiss onto her child’s forehead, a lock of her hair fell out from underneath the hat. Her husband grinned and swept it out of her face in such a natural move that it was obvious he had done it countless times in the past. She turned her face to him and as their eyes met, they smiled. Risking scandal, they shared a quick kiss before they both looked back down at the babe in her arms. 

The Doctor’s mouth softened into a small smile, but it was no longer the girl he was seeing. Instead he saw Rose in a pink jumper and jeans, her long blonde hair swept up into a knot at the nape of her neck, her—their—baby in her arms.

He shook his head vigorously, forcing his mind to return to the present. That wasn’t Rose, and the man wasn’t him. Could never be him. That life, a normal, human life one day after another on the slow path, was the one adventure he could never have.

He tried to look away, to return to the task at hand, but he found he couldn't tear his eyes away from the scene in front of him. They seemed so happy together.

As the Doctor continued to watch them, he scanned their timelines. His hearts sank at what he saw. Eyes glistening, he turned away, trying to swallow the large lump that had formed in his throat. Although the girl survived the disaster, her husband and their child didn’t. He closed his eyes tightly and pinched the bridge of his nose as he shoved down the wave of emotion that threatened to rise to the surface.

It wasn’t fair. And what’s more, it wasn’t necessary. Their deaths weren’t a fixed point. 

A tiny voice whispered in the back of his head. _What would Rose do? What would she want him to do?_

The answer was so obvious it didn’t require thought, but short of dragging them off the dock and imprisoning them until the ship left, how could he save them? What could he say, what could he do, that would convince them not to get onboard?

Then the Doctor grinned as an idea occurred to him. He patted his pockets. Most of the contents weren’t particularly valuable, in fact a lot of it could be classified as junk, but there were a few things… 

He closed the distance between himself and the couple.

“Excuse me,” he said to them. “May I talk with you for a moment? A traveling companion and I need to get to New York quickly, very quickly in fact, due to a very, very urgent matter that we must attend to as soon as possible, and I was wondering if I could interest you in a business proposition…” 

~oOo~

Mickey made his way back up the dock, looking for the inspection queue and scanning the crowd for the shorn head and dark leather jacket of the first Doctor he had met. After several minutes of searching, he reached the pavement that ran perpendicular to the dock and realized he had gone too far.

 _Damn_ , he thought, and began to retrace his steps.

As he walked back down the dock, he looked again through the crowds of people, still not spotting the Doctor’s trademark leather jacket.

“Oi!” yelled a loud male voice from behind him. “Get out of the way!”

Mickey turned around and his eyes widened as he found himself nose to nose with a horse. 

He swallowed nervously. He knew nothing about horses except that this one was big, brown, and harnessed to an ornate carriage. 

Blimey, the horse was big. 

Really, really big.

Since when did horses grow so big?

“Oi!” came a voice, the same voice, from somewhere above his head. Startled, Mickey looked up. The coachman was glaring down at him from the driver’s seat of the carriage. 

“Get out of the way!” the coachman yelled again. As if in agreement, the horse snorted in Mickey’s face.

“Eww,” Mickey complained. Wiping his face with his hands, he stepped out of the way. The coachman lifted the reins, coaxing the horse forward, and with a toss of his head the horse began to move. As he walked past, he lifted his tail. 

Mickey looked down at the steaming mess on the ground in front of him. He pulled a face. “Disgusting.”

Wiping his hands on his trousers, and carefully avoiding the fragrant trail of manure, he began to walk back down the dock, again looking for the inspection queue where he hoped the leather clad Doctor would be. He finally found it near the gangplank to the third class entrance, almost exactly where he had left the Doctor he was traveling with. 

As he looked further down the dock he sighed. Hundreds were in the queue. They were gathered in family groups and appeared to be just standing around, which was part of the reason he hadn’t recognized it as a queue at all. On the crowded dock, he had walked right past it and not seen it.

He glanced back at the third class gangplank. The Doctor had said that third class ticket holders would board first, but it didn’t look like people were getting on the ship yet. That meant Charley’s family was probably still waiting for inspection. He knew there were four of them—a father, a mother, and two children—but he had no idea what any of them looked like. Nor did he know the ages of the children. If he had known that, it could have narrowed down the possibilities to a manageable number. On the other hand, he couldn’t even remember what Charley’s last name was, so it was pointless to go up and down the queue asking people if they were related to her.

And there was still no sign of the Doctor.

This was beginning to look like a fool’s errand.

“And I’m the fool,” he said under his breath.

Mickey scanned the crowd again, looking for anyone he recognized, namely Charley or any one of the three Doctors that were here somewhere. After several frustrating moments he finally spotted the current Doctor standing about fifty yards down the dock from him. Despite the distance, it was clearly him; he stood out from the crowd due to his height, his lack of a hat, and his long brown coat. He was talking to a couple: a young man possibly Mickey’s own age and a young woman maybe a little bit younger—the man’s wife Mickey supposed. She looked like she was carrying a baby.

As they spoke, the Doctor reached deep into the pocket of his overcoat, far deeper than he should have been able to do, and pulled something out of it. From this distance, Mickey couldn’t tell what it was, and given it had come out of the Doctor’s pocket he knew it could be anything. 

The Doctor put on his glasses and peered at it, turning it over and over in his hand. Finally he nodded, obviously satisfied with what he saw, and pressed it into the man’s hand. 

Mickey’s brow furrowed in puzzlement. “What the hell’s he doin’?” he muttered.

After examining the object closely himself, the man vigorously shook the Doctor’s hand. Then he reached into the interior pocket of his jacket and handed something that looked like papers to the Doctor.

Curious, Mickey took a step towards the Doctor and immediately stopped again when he heard a familiar, rough Northern voice ring out behind him.

“Excuse me. I’m lookin’ for the Robertson family,” he said. 

Mickey spun around. There he was, the Doctor he’d been looking for, but he wasn’t dressed in his typical leather jacket and dark jeans. Instead, he was wearing an old fashioned, conservative black suit with a double breasted, knee length coat. And was that an ascot? 

He looked familiar, but not as the Doctor. Mickey realized he’d probably walked past him three times in the last fifteen minutes. Dressed like that, it was even more difficult to recognize him than it had been in the garage, and there he’d had long hair and the beginnings of a scruffy beard. It was only when he’d heard his voice that he’d known who he was.

 _He looks like a bloody undertaker_ , Mickey thought. 

No one seemed to be paying any attention to the Doctor, so he spoke again, projecting his voice so it carried over both the sounds of the ship and the crowds. “I’m looking for the Edwin Robertson family. Would the Robertson family please step forward?”

As the Doctor turned in his direction, Mickey darted behind a large family. Although he wasn’t sure the Doctor would recognize him—after all the Doctor’d barely noticed his existence when they’d met—he didn’t want to take the chance of the other man seeing him more than seventy years before he’d been born. 

The Doctor continued walking down the dock, scanning the queue and continuing to call for the Robertson family.

And moving in the direction of his older but younger looking self.

Meanwhile the older Doctor was talking to people he seemed to pick at random, but was generally making his way up the dock.

Mickey swore. They were headed right for each other.

He took off down the dock, dodging people and trying to catch the attention of one Doctor while avoiding being noticed by the other.

When Mickey finally reached him, he bent over, hands on knees, trying to catch his breath. “Found him,” he said. “Man, I gotta get in shape.”

“Where is he?” the Doctor asked.

“Right up the dock a bit,” he answered, still gasping for air. “And headed this way.”

They both turned their heads when they heard the other Doctor.

“Attention please. I’m lookin’ for the Robertson family,” he called. “The Edwin Robertson family.”

“That’s us,” someone called back.

A short, middle-aged man stepped forward from the crowd. Behind him followed a dowdy woman with two small children, a boy and a girl, clinging to her hands.

The Doctor pulled some papers out of an inside pocket of his coat. He made a show of reading them. “Are you Edwin Robertson? From… Banbury? Husband of…” He rustled through the papers. “Rachel Anne Robertson?”

The couple exchanged nervous glances.

“That’s me.”

The Doctor turned to the woman. “And are you Rachel Anne Robertson? Father Jacob Pollard and mother…” He looked through the papers again. “Sophia Pollard?” 

She bit her lip and nodded. “Yeah, that’s me,” she said. 

“If you would follow me please?” The Doctor said. His tone indicated that they had no choice in the matter. He gestured to the White Star Terminal behind them. When they didn’t immediately move, he continued. “Come on. Let’s go.”

Clearly troubled, Edwin and Rachel Robinson exchanged glances again before they each picked up a child and their luggage and followed him. They quickly disappeared into the crowd.

“Now what?” Mickey asked.

The Doctor in brown pinstripes nodded in the direction the others had gone. “Follow me, well, him. Watch to see if anything unusual happens. I don’t think anything will, but just in case…”

Mickey nodded. “While I’m doin’ that, what’re you gonna do?”

“I am going to go and find his TARDIS,” the Doctor answered. “I’m going to see if whatever damaged the TARDIS has happened yet.” He pulled his sonic screwdriver out of the depths of one of his pockets. “Since I know where my own is and where the one is that belongs to my youngest self, I should be able to find his. Then it’s just a matter of letting myself in, scanning her, and checking her memory banks. Without getting caught, of course. Meet me back at the TARDIS, my TARDIS, in… let’s say half an hour.” The Doctor shook his finger at Mickey. “Just make sure he doesn’t spot you. Got it? It’s vitally important he doesn’t spot you,” he reminded him.

“I know, I know,” he snapped. He moved off in the direction the other Doctor had gone. Behind him the Doctor called, “Don’t forget! Half an hour!”

Mickey rolled his eyes.


	22. Chapter Twenty-One

**Chapter Twenty-One—Titanic dock, Southampton, 10 April 1912**

Mickey cut through the crowd and entered the large White Star terminal building. The lobby was only slightly less crowded than the dock. People, mostly from first class, wandered about or stood in groups chatting with others also waiting to board. Off to one side of the room was a large doorway labeled “First Class Lounge” while on the far side of the room was some sort of reception desk, behind which stood a number of men in the uniforms of the White Star Line. There, like everywhere else, was a long queue in front of it.

He shook his head. “I don’t have time for this.” He crossed the lobby to the desk, bypassing the queue, and spoke to the nearest staff member who had just finished helping an elderly couple. “Hey, did you see a tall man with really short hair walk through here? He’s wearing a black suit and was with a couple with two kids.”

The man shot Mickey a look. “Are you kidding? Do you know how many people I’ve seen today?” He turned away from him to face the queue. “Next.”

With a huff of frustration, Mickey turned back to the crowded room. “Where the hell is he?” he muttered. “He just came in here. Where did he go?” He scanned the room, finally spotting him leading the Richardson family through a narrow door on the opposite side of the room. “Ha! Got him!”

He rushed across the lobby, but once outside the door he stopped and stared at it. “Now what?” he said aloud. He felt a bit like a kitten who had been chasing a mouse but didn’t quite know what to do with it when he caught it.

The door was slightly ajar, and the voice of Edwin Robertson filtered through the crack. “What’s all this about then?”

Mickey carefully pushed on the door to widen the crack a tiny bit, allowing him to hear the conversation more clearly, and then leaned against the wall with his arms crossed. To all appearances he was just waiting to board the ship like everyone else in the room.

“Mr and Mrs Robertson,” the Doctor began, “My name is John Smith, and for the last ten years I have served as the solicitor to Mrs Robertson’s distant uncle, Gerald Pollard.”

“I don’t remember having—” Rachel Robertson began.

The Doctor continued as if she hadn’t spoken, effectively cutting her off. “I regret to inform you that Mr Pollard recently passed.”

“You came all this way, pulled us out of the queue to tell us her uncle died, an uncle she’s never even heard of?” Edwin demanded incredulously.

“If you would allow me to continue,” the Doctor said haughtily. Mickey snorted. It was the same tone of voice that Doctor had used to call him “Mickey the Idiot”, but this time he wasn’t on the receiving end of it. “Mr Pollard had a large estate east of Manchester that Mrs Robertson visited several times as a young child. He had fond memories of her and chose to remember her in his will.”

Mickey heard Mrs Robertson gasp dramatically. He snickered. “This is better than an episode of EastEnders,” he said under his breath.

“When you say he remembered her in his will,” Edwin said, “how… well… did he remember her?” 

“It’s just a small sum,” the Doctor answered. “£5,000.”

There was dead silence. You could have heard a pin drop in the room, Mickey thought. Even he knew that was an enormous amount of money to someone in the early twentieth century. Hell, on the estate it wasn’t anything to sneeze at in 2007.

After a moment he heard some papers rustling, and the Doctor explained that there were some papers to sign and that the funds would then be at their disposal. He named a prominent bank in London.

“You will, however, have to appear in person as soon as possible to complete the paperwork at the bank itself in order to withdraw the funds. It would, of course, prevent you from sailing today...”

As the Doctor continued to give them instructions—the Robertsons were silent, probably due to shock—Mickey glanced at his watch. Twenty minutes had already passed. Nothing unusual had happened, unless you counted the fact that the Doctor was masquerading as a solicitor and basically handing out money, something he had never ever expected the Doctor to do.

And then he suddenly realized what his Doctor had been doing on the dock. When he’d been talking to that couple, he must have been buying their tickets off them. His mouth twisted into a grin. Usually the Doctor went for flash, saving history, saving planets… Saving that family was the most compassionate, most _domestic_ thing he’d ever seen the alien do. And he began to see what Rose saw in him.

The conversation in the room began to die off, and he heard the sounds of chairs moving, as if they were getting ready to leave. If he didn’t leave immediately he risked being seen.

“That’s my cue,” Mickey said under his breath. He headed out of the building and made his way back to the TARDIS.

~oOo~

The Doctor let himself into his former self’s TARDIS. To his relief the TARDIS hadn’t shocked him, and the key had turned easily in the lock.

He pushed open the door and made his way inside, noting the minute differences between this console room and his own. If he hadn’t known it was his previous self’s TARDIS already, merely entering the cavernous space would have told him immediately it wasn’t his. Some of the controls on the console were different, and others were in different places. There were fewer post-it notes. The jump seat was in a slightly, almost imperceptibly different spot—shifted approximately a centimeter and a half to the left—and one of the rips on the seat was smaller. Even the ambient light was at a different wavelength, although no one but a Time Lord would notice.

Even more telling, the coat thrown over the branching coral strut wasn’t his long brown coat but the heavy leather jacket he used to wear in his last body.

The Doctor pulled out his sonic screwdriver. As the tip lit up and it softly whirred, he slowly circled the room, scanning everything—console, walls, floors, even the jump seat—for evidence of damage of any kind at all. He frowned as he looked at the results. There wasn’t any sign of damage per se, but the readings weren’t clear either. It was almost like there was an echo of damage rather than damage itself.

Weird.

He scratched the back of his neck thoughtfully as he crossed to the console monitor. The CCTV record was clear but unhelpful. At this point in the TARDIS’s linear time, if there was such a thing, he had left the Powell estate and had made two stops before this one: to Dallas in 1963, and to the planet Anaranjado in the Redalian sector. Nothing had happened in Dallas, not to cause these problems at any rate. He was certain of it. It was possible that something had happened on Anaranjado, he thought, but extremely unlikely. It was a peaceful, agricultural planet and one of his favorite spots for replenishing foodstuffs. If something had happened there, however, there should be a record of it in the temporal neural net.

A trigger of the CCTV of the exterior of the TARDIS while on Anaranjado told him nothing. The ship had landed in the center of an orchard, and the Doctor watched his younger self leave the TARDIS. After fast-forwarding a bit, he saw him return carrying a large sack. Switching to an interior view showed him leaving the console room and entering the galley where he unloaded bananas, oranges, apples, and assorted tea bags from the sack and stowed them away. 

Definitely a dead end. 

It appeared that whatever had happened hadn’t happened yet.

But then again there had been that weird echo he had picked up with his sonic.

The Doctor scanned the TARDIS again, this time with the TARDIS’s own self-diagnostic programs. A series of interlocking geometric shapes rotated on the monitor and a speaker built into one of the control panels let out a quiet ping ping ping as the TARDIS searched for any problems. Three minutes in—two minutes and forty-seven seconds before the scan should have been finished—the pinging stopped. The screen froze rather than displaying the results of the scan. 

The Doctor frowned.

“Well, that shouldn’t happen,” he said. Pulling out his glasses and peering into the screen, he rapidly flipped a switch next to the monitor. The display began to rotate again. But it was a millisecond off compared to relative time. 

Searching for the source of the glitch, he climbed under the console and opened a panel on the underside of the control panel. A variety of interconnected glowing pear-shaped and spherical items—memory pods and ganglionic circuits—fell out of the gaping hole and almost hit him in the face. They hung from the open panel by tubes pulsing in the same blue-green as the Time Rotor. He scanned everything with his screwdriver: pods, temporal circuits, even the main memory core. There was a tiny blip in the temporal relay, one the TARDIS herself didn’t acknowledge even existed. And it didn’t appear to have a cause.

Troubled, he climbed back out from his spot under the console. He was running out of time. If he stayed any longer, he risked running into himself, and even if he stayed longer there was no guarantee that he’d find anything new. He downloaded everything he’d discovered into his screwdriver for further analysis in his own TARDIS. He just hoped his own TARDIS was up to it.

Later, back at his own TARDIS the Doctor found Mickey sitting on the ground, arms crossed and with his back leaning against the door. The younger man scowled at him.

“How long have you been waiting for me?” the Doctor asked.

“An hour,” Mickey said crossly as he stood up. “I’ve been sittin’ here an hour. After you told me to meet you in a half an hour. That was an hour and a half ago!” He shook his head. “For a Time Lord you sure have a lousy sense of time.”

The Doctor ignored the comment and unlocked the door. 

Inside, the hum of the TARDIS’s engines was quieter than normal, the glowing roundels dimmer, particularly compared to the TARDIS he had just left. First tossing his coat on one of the struts—the same place his earlier self’s leather jacket had been in the other TARDIS—he crossed to the console and plugged his sonic screwdriver into a small hole that appeared on one of the panels. He put on his glasses and stared into the monitor.

Mickey joined him at the console. “So, did you figure out what’s goin’ on?” 

The Doctor waved him off and shushed him. As he studied the display in front of him, he ran his hands through his hair, causing it to stand straight up, and let out a frustrated groan. He backed up and sank down on the jump seat.

“What is it?” Mickey asked in a low voice.

“I think the TARDIS has been poisoned,” the Doctor told him quietly.

“What!” Mickey looked around himself, as if he was expecting something to attack them. “Should we even be in here?”

“You aren’t in any danger,” the Doctor said. “Me on the other hand…” He sighed. “It’s a poison that only affects Time sensitive creatures, like the TARDIS. And Time Lords.” He rested his elbows on his knees and dropped his head into his hands.

“So…” Mickey said tentatively. “What do we do now? How do we fix it? Is there some sort of an antidote?”

“I don’t know. Depends on what caused it, what the source was, and when it happened.” He sat up. After pulling off his glasses and sticking them in his pocket, he rubbed his left eye, a move that expanded into massaging his forehead. “His TARDIS has a temporal glitch. But at the same time it doesn’t. It’s echoing back from the future. His future, not ours,” he clarified. At the blank expression on Mickey’s face the Doctor continued. “Something happened, I don’t know what, but whatever it was is creating ripples backwards and forwards in time.”

“Like a pebble in a pond,” Mickey said.

“Exactly. At some point in his future and my past he and the TARDIS were poisoned, probably accidentally. I'm guessing it happened so gradually that he didn’t realize it was happening at all. But eventually the TARDIS became so ill that she needed to shut down in order to slow the damage.”

“So why’d she turn you human?”

“Humans aren’t Time sensitive. By turning him human she saved his life. Then she tried to contact us, call us back to the Powell estate to help, to fix her and to cure him.” He jumped up and began to pace back and forth in front of the console. “But somehow, probably because she was sick, the message arrived late. Too late. By the time it arrived, the damage had managed to spread to our TARDIS.”

“Can’t we just go and warn, you know, the other you?”

“Not without creating a nasty paradox. And even if we could, what do we say? That something’s going to happen sometime that will poison both you and the TARDIS, but we don’t know what it is or when it happens and you won’t know either until it’s too late?” He stopped in his tracks. “The Time Lords would have been able to fix this, heal the TARDIS, heal me, prevent a paradox, just like that.” He snapped his fingers. “Piece of cake, home in time for tea. But the Time Lords are gone.”

“Hold on,” Mickey said. “If this, whatever it is, is going forwards and backwards in Time, isn’t that going to start affecting the other one of you who’s here?”

The Doctor shook his head. “No. The TARDIS won’t let it. She won’t allow herself to be at the center of a paradox. She’d rather die first, and if I can’t somehow figure out how to fix this, that’s exactly what’s going to happen.”

He stepped in front of the controls and began flipping switches. “It’s time to get you home.” He spun a dial on the other side of the console and then raised a large lever. A loud groan filled the room, but the Time Rotor didn’t move. “Come on, come on, come on,” he said under his breath. He pushed the lever back down. His fingers flew across a colorful key pad, then he spun the dial and raised the lever again.

The groan was louder this time. The room shook.

The Doctor slammed his hand down on the console and then repeated his movements. Switches. Key pad. Dial. Lever.

The shaking grew stronger.

Switches. Key pad. Dial. Lever. 

As the groaning continued, the Doctor moved faster and faster.

Switches. Key pad. Dial. Lever. 

Switches. Key pad. Dial. Lever. 

Switches. Key pad. Dial. Lever.

After one last jolt, the shaking stopped. The lights dimmed, and an unnatural quiet fell over the room. Even the ever present hum of the engines was gone.

Motionless, the Doctor stared at the console.

After several long moments, Mickey broke the silence. “We’re stuck here, yeah?”

The Doctor didn’t answer immediately. He wanted to yell, to kick something, to punch someone. He wanted to rage against the universe.

But he couldn’t. Someone was depending on him.

He turned to face Mickey. “No,” he said, his voice filled with determination and resolve. He tugged down on his jacket, straightening it. “No. I won’t let you get stuck here. There are two other me’s out there. One of them might be able to take you home.”

“I thought you didn’t want them to see me.”

“Can’t be helped now. I don’t want to trap you here if there’s another option.” He turned away and began to fiddle with the controls. “Maybe if I contact my Eighth self…” he said thoughtfully. “No, that wouldn’t work. He ends up on the Titanic…”

“Eighth?” Mickey asked. His eyebrows shot up almost to his hairline. “Blimey, how many of you have there been?”

The Doctor ignored the question as he continued his own train of thought. “But if I told him Charley’s family gets saved by his future self, he and Charley wouldn’t get on the Titanic at all. It would cause a minor ripple in time, but it wouldn’t cause a paradox.” He nodded slowly. “He could take you home and then force himself to forget you. And me. That version of me had memory problems anyway. He won’t think twice about not remembering an hour or two.”

“Which one is the Eighth?” Mickey asked. 

The Doctor turned to him and raised an eyebrow. “The one you described as ‘a refugee from a Jane Austin novel’.”

“Still think it fits,” Mickey answered. “So if he’s the Eighth, which one are you?”

“Does it really matter?” the Doctor asked in disbelief. 

“Probably not, but I still want to know.”

The Doctor let out a huff of exasperation. “Oh, all right. I’m the Tenth Doctor. Satisfied? Now be quiet and let me think for a minute.”

“Tenth?” Mickey asked. “Wow. Does Rose know?”

“Get some perspective here, Mickey!” the Doctor said sharply. “The TARDIS is dying, you are currently stuck in 1912, and I’m trying to figure out a way to get you home without causing a massive paradox. Now just shut up for a minute!”

“All right,” Mickey answered. “Right after you answer one more thing. If the TARDIS isn’t working and you’re sending me home, what’re you gonna do?”

“I’m going to stay here and see if I can figure out a way of healing the TARDIS.”

“I thought you couldn’t do that without knowing what caused the poisoning.”

“I’m very clever,” the Doctor responded. “Given enough time, I should be able to figure out something.”

“If that’s true, then why are you sendin’ me home?” Mickey asked pointedly.

“Because it would be easier on you,” the Doctor snapped. “Having one of me take you home would be easier on you than having you here when…”

“When what?” Mickey snapped back.

“When I disappear!” he exploded. He stalked to the other side of the console and laid his hands on it. He closed his eyes. Despite her weakened state, he felt the warmth of her presence in his hands and in his mind. He let it wash over him, helping him calm himself.

After a moment he took a deep breath and looked up at the younger man. “You were right before. Before we came here, you were right about what would happen. If I can’t solve this, if I can’t figure out a way of getting rid of the Time toxins in the TARDIS, Rose will never be able to get to the watch and the human me will stay human, will never change back. And if he never changes back…”

“You won’t regenerate into… you,” Mickey finished.

“Yeah,” the Doctor said quietly. “This timeline will cease to exist. And if that happens, it will be easier on you mentally to be on the estate.”

“Easier than what? Being trapped in 1912?”

“That’s one possibility, but the far more likely possibility is that none of this will have ever happened and you’ll just wake up on the estate one morning with two sets of memories for the last two years. Due to the ricochet nature of Time, it will be easier on you to cope both mentally and physically with it if you're already there.”

Mickey was silent for a moment, taking it in. “What about Rose?” he said. “Will she have two sets of memories?”

“Yes,” the Doctor answered. “Jackie too. Since the three of you know me, this me, you three are at ground zero in all this. You’ll remember, but no one else will.”

“But what about…” Mickey took a deep breath before continuing. “What about all the things you’ve done... like protectin’ us from aliens and things? Like when the Sycorax came, or the bat things with Sarah Jane? You know, all the ‘it is defended’ stuff?”

“You humans are brilliant. You would have managed to save yourselves. Mind you, it might have taken a little longer, but you would have done it eventually.” The Doctor’s mouth twisted into a grin. “Besides, I’ll still be there. Even as a human I’d still be a genius. After all, it wouldn't be the first time an auto mechanic helped save the world,” he said with a wink.

A small smile crossed Mickey’s face which quickly faded. He shook his head. “No. It’s not fair. Rose was right. You saved the planet so many times… There must be something else we could do.”

“There isn’t. Whatever poisoned the TARDIS isn’t here, and with the TARDIS unable to take off, we can’t search anywhere else. Unless…” The Doctor’s voice trailed off and his brow furrowed thoughtfully. 

“Unless what?”

“It most likely wouldn’t work…” he muttered. 

“What wouldn’t work?” Mickey asked. 

“I could link my TARDIS to his and allow his to tow mine to wherever he goes. Then I could search for sources of the Time toxin everywhere he goes in the universe. It would have to be done very, very carefully of course so he doesn’t notice,” he said thoughtfully. “And of course there’s always the possibility that the stress of being pulled into the Time Vortex instead of entering it under her own power could rip my TARDIS apart, ripping me apart at the same time.” He grimaced. “Not a pleasant way to go. On the other hand, it could work.” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “And considering the alternative is ceasing to exist due to being part of an aborted timeline, it’s definitely worth a shot.” He nodded decisively. “But first we need to get my previous self to take you home. Don’t want you to be ripped apart in the Time Vortex.”

“Yeah,” Mickey said quietly. “Don’t want that.” 

The Doctor pulled his sonic screwdriver out of the hole in the console and stuck it in his pocket before grabbing his coat and heading for the door. He turned back when he realized Mickey wasn’t following him. “Let’s go. We need to catch my other self before he leaves. You don’t want to miss your ride.”

Mickey nodded and took a step towards the door before stopping again. “If I go with you instead of with him, what happens to me if it doesn’t work?”

“You would be painfully ripped apart along with me.”

“And then?”

“And then you would probably wake up in your own bed on the Powell estate with memories of an excruciating death, a death that would haunt your dreams for the rest of your life, but I can’t guarantee it. That’s the best case scenario. The Time Vortex is a tricky thing. Not even the Time Lords understood it completely. You could just die outright, without coming back. It’s even possible that you dying in the Time Vortex could totally wipe you from existence, prevent you from ever being born in the first place.” He jerked his head towards the door. “So let’s go. I need to send you off before I start connecting the two TARDISes, so there’s no time to waste.”

“No,” Mickey said slowly. “I can’t believe I’m sayin’ this, but I’m stayin’ with you. Rose asked me to watch out for you, and that’s what I’m gonna do.” The Doctor started to protest, but Mickey interrupted him. “You’re gonna need my help. Don’t bother tryin’ to deny it. Rose’d never forgive me if I coulda helped you but didn’t. And frankly… I’d never forgive myself either. So I don’t care what you say. I’m stayin’.”


	23. Chapter Twenty-Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a little shorter than most of the others because it was originally intended to be part of the last two chapters. For those of you keeping track, the next one will take place back on the estate. :)
> 
> Although I haven't been posting chapters on this all that quickly, writing and posting the rest of the story may take a little longer than I originally intended. I got a new job and it is taking up a lot more of my time. But I'm still committed to this story and I'll finish it as quickly as I can. Thanks for sticking with the story and I hope you enjoy the rest.

**Chapter Twenty-Two—Southampton, 10 April 1912**

As the Doctor stared at him, Mickey stared back. Without the hum of the TARDIS’s engines, without the Doctor’s constant chatter, the silence in the room was overwhelming. The sound of his heart pounding in his chest echoed in his ears while the Doctor’s words echoed in his head.

_“You would be painfully ripped apart along with me.”_

_“And then you would probably wake up in your own bed on the Powell estate with memories of an excruciating death, a death that would haunt your dreams for the rest of your life...”_

_“That’s the best case scenario.”_

Every instinct told him to run, to accept the offer the Doctor had made of one of his other selves returning him home to the estate, to safety. By staying with the Doctor, he could be killed only to wake up find that time had been rewritten and he had two sets of memories. Or he could die outright. Or he could be totally wiped from existence. He pushed the thoughts away from him as hard as he could, but he was only partially successful. The fear crept into his mind and his heart, but he refused to allow it to cripple him.

The air fairly crackled between them in the battle of wills. Mickey knew that the Doctor was powerful, probably more powerful than he could even imagine. The alien had saved entire planets—the entire universe if Rose was to be believed. But despite the fact that Mickey had seen him bring down a government with six words and defeat aliens so dangerous they were beyond his comprehension, he was determined not to allow him to win this one. He couldn’t back down. The Doctor might not think less of him, but he’d think less of himself if he didn’t go through with this.

Mickey swallowed hard before speaking.

“You are going to need me,” he said evenly, determined not to allow the fear he felt to creep into his voice. “Don’t bother tryin’ to deny it.”

For the span of a dozen heartbeats, the Doctor continued to stare at him, evaluating him. He forced himself not to react. 

Finally the Doctor’s face broke into a wide grin. “Then we’d better get busy!” He rushed back down the ramp, opened a compartment under the floor, and pulled out a battered cardboard shoebox. After searching the box for a moment, he pulled something tiny out.

“Here,” he said, shoving it into Mickey’s hand. It looked like a tiny hearing aid, similar to the ones the Doctor was wearing. “Put this in your ear.” He dropped the box back into the storage compartment and slammed the grating back in place. The sound echoed through the room.

As Mickey put the tiny device in place, the Doctor pulled one of his telepathic dampers out of his own ear and sonicked it before putting it back. 

“Now I estimate we’ve got about fifteen, maybe twenty minutes to link the two TARDISes,” he continued as he rushed back up the ramp and out the door. Mickey followed in his wake. “In thirty minutes the Titanic will sail, and if I know myself, which I do intimately, I’ll stay the whole time on the dock, trying to convince people not to board.”

“What do you need me to do?” Mickey asked.

The Doctor pulled the door shut and locked it. “I need you to watch out for me, either me, and let me know if you see either me. Or Charley since she’d recognize the TARDIS as well,” he answered. He turned and strode down the alley. Mickey had to jog to catch up. “While you do that, I’ll be linking the two TARDISes using his console.”

The Doctor led the way in the opposite direction of the harbor, to a narrow street about three blocks away.

“The TARDIS is about a block further down the road,” he said. “I need you to stay here, and if you see either of my previous selves, particularly my last self, tell me.”

“You want me to run to the TARDIS and tell you if I see one of them?” Mickey asked.

“No,” the Doctor replied. “The device in your ear is a two way radio. I’ve adjusted one of my telepathic dampers to work as one too. There’s a little switch on the one in your ear. Once you flip it, if you say something, I’ll hear you, and if I say anything you’ll hear it.” 

Mickey reached up to his ear and toggled the switch. “How’s that?” he asked.

The Doctor cried out and covered his ears. “You must have hit the volume transmission control,” he said through gritted teeth. He thrust out his hand. “Give it to me.”

“Sorry.” Mickey pulled the transmitter out of his ear and handed it to the Doctor, who adjusted it and handed it back. He put it back in his ear. “How do you know he’ll come this way?” 

The Doctor gave him a withering look. “He’s me, remember? Besides, this is the most direct route from the dock to his TARDIS. I estimate he’ll be passing by here in approximately twenty-five minutes. In that length of time I need to finish linking the TARDISes and we need to be back in my TARDIS, ready and waiting for him to take off.”

Mickey nodded. As the Doctor ran down the street, he walked over to a lamppost on the corner. With a sigh, he leaned back against it, crossed his arms, and began to watch.

~oOo~

Once back in his younger self’s TARDIS, the Doctor immediately climbed back under the console and began to rewire the controls. Although he’d had to remotely control TARDISes in the past and even tow them on occasion, he’d never tried to do what he was doing now: have his younger self tow an older version of his TARDIS with his own TARDIS, particularly without his younger self knowing he was doing it. 

This was incredibly dangerous. The odds of creating a disaster were astronomical, and he didn’t want to even consider what the risk of creating a paradox was. And that was before factoring in the danger of two interconnected versions of the same TARDIS entering the Vortex together.

For a moment he considered giving up, allowing events to take their course even if it meant the end of this timeline, his personal death and with it, the extinction of the Time Lords. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t considered dying before. When he had set off the Moment, when he had ended the Time War at the cost of his planet and his people, he had intended to die with them. 

But this wasn’t just about him. Whatever he did or didn’t do affected the TARDIS as well. If he was right about the TARDIS being poisoned, and he was certain he was, she wouldn’t be able to heal herself. He could face his own death, he could face the extinction of the Time Lords, but he couldn’t face the death of the last of the TARDISes. Not if there was something he could do about it.

With the temporal vortex regulator in one hand and his sonic screwdriver in his mouth, he reached above his head and grabbed the vortex manipulator bypass. A bright blue spark lit up the area under the console. 

“Ow!” he yelled, letting go of both the bypass and the regulator. As he yelled, the sonic dropped out of his mouth, landed on the floor, and rolled out of reach. He swore and stuck his singed fingers in his mouth.

“I can hear you, you know,” Mickey said in his ear.

The Doctor ignored him. As he reached for his screwdriver, he hit his head hard on the underside of the console. Wincing, he swore again.

“Wow, I didn’t even know you knew those words,” Mickey said. 

“I can speak five billion languages, Mickey,” the Doctor snapped as he picked up his screwdriver. “I know more curses in more languages than you can possibly imagine.” He grabbed the bypass again and was shocked again. And again he swore.

“What does that one mean?” Mickey asked.

“You’re too young to know,” the Doctor said irritably. “Now shut up and let me work!”

Mickey fell silent, and he sighed in relief.

Not wanting to be shocked again, this time the Doctor looked up at the bypass before grabbing it... and groaned. Instead of one, there were two pieces of equipment hanging from the hole above his head. When he had thought he was grabbing the bypass, he was actually grabbing the dematerialization condenser. If he wasn’t more careful, he thought, he wouldn’t have to worry about disappearing due to an aborted timeline. He’d shock himself into oblivion first.

Cursing under his breath, he grabbed the actual bypass and began to reroute the power through the manipulator.

Several minutes later he connected the final wire to the regulator. As he began to pull the reduction inducer out of its housing, Mickey hissed in his ear.

“He’s coming!"

“Where is he?”

“He just rounded the corner. He’s about two blocks away.”

The Doctor shoved everything back into the compartment and screwed the panel back in place. Then he jumped out from under the console and rushed around it, programming the controls as he went. “Mickey, go back to our TARDIS as quickly as you can, without drawing attention to yourself,” he ordered. “Make sure he doesn’t spot you. I’ll meet you there.”

He slammed a hand down on a big red button on one of the control panels, grabbed his long brown coat from the strut and ran out of the TARDIS, yanking the door shut behind him. He began to sprint down the street, pulling on his coat as he went. It flapped behind him.

In his rush he hadn’t bothered to lock the door. He just hoped his younger self didn’t notice.

~oOo~

Mickey casually strolled up the street, occasionally glancing behind himself to make sure he hadn’t been spotted by the younger Doctor. Once he turned the corner, however, he ran flat out to the TARDIS.

Rose had told him so much about traveling with the Doctor—about the monsters, about distant planets and spaceships, about meeting famous people from the past—but she had never mentioned just how much running was involved.

Traveling with the Doctor was better than a gym membership.

When he got to the TARDIS, the door already stood open. Panting, he ran in and discovered the Doctor already in the console room, pulling off his coat.

“Close the door! Close the door!” the Doctor ordered as he threw his coat over a nearby strut and removed the telepathic dampers out of his ears. 

Mickey did as he was told and then removed the two way radio out of his ear and flipped it off. 

The Doctor darted under the console. Mickey heard the sonic screwdriver begin to whir. Sparks flew out from under the console.

“I wasn’t able to finish making the connections,” the Doctor told him. “So I’ve got to try to finish them on this end. The problem is that not only do I have to duplicate what I did there, but we’ll have to try to enter the Vortex at the same time as he does. And I estimate he’ll be ready to leave in approximately forty-seven seconds.”

“But last time you tried, the TARDIS couldn’t enter the Vortex,” Mickey protested. “The engine wouldn’t even turn over.”

The Doctor ducked his head out from under the console. “Not a bad analogy,” he said, sounding surprised. “You could think of it like we’re using his TARDIS to jumpstart ours.” He returned to sonicking something under the console. “The connections I did finish should allow us to syphon off just enough energy to get the engines started. Even if it doesn’t work we’ve got to try, or none of this is going to be worth anything. As it stands, since I couldn’t finish the connections at his end, his TARDIS won’t be able to tow ours fully into the Time Vortex, leaving us on the border between the Vortex and normal space.” 

“And if that happens?” Mickey asked.

“Boom.”

“Oh.”

The Doctor jumped out from under the console and ran to the monitor. “One of the things I was able to do was create a one-way link to monitor his console room.”

“So we can watch him, but he won’t know,” Mickey guessed.

“Yep. And he won’t be able to see us,” the Doctor answered. “Well, he probably won’t. Maybe.” He began twisting a knob next to the monitor, and a picture of the other console room appeared on the display.

The Doctor grinned at Mickey. “So far, so good.” He paused and stared thoughtfully into the monitor. “The trick is going to be to program in his coordinates, copy exactly what he does, in the order he does, and dematerialize when he does. We’ll have less than half a second to duplicate his every movement. If we’re successful, if he notices us we should just appear to be an echo located within his own console rather than from outside the TARDIS.”

“How the hell are you going to watch the monitor and program the controls at the same time?” Mickey asked dubiously.

“I’m not,” he replied. “I’m going to watch the monitor and you are going to program the controls.”

“What! I can’t fly the TARDIS!”

“You won’t be. I will be. All you’ll be is my hands. And my feet.” He stared off into space thoughtfully. “And sometimes my nose,” he said. “Anyway… I’ll tell you exactly what to do. All you’ll be doing is following my instructions.” 

Mickey shook his head. “I dunno…”

“Mickey Smith, I’ve seen you shoot missiles at number 10. You can do this.” He glanced back at the display and his eyes widened. He shoved on his glasses and stared at the monitor. “And we need to do it now! Get to the opposite panel and spin the red dial two and a half times clockwise. Then spin the blue dial counterclockwise three times. Then flip the orange switch on and off twice.”

While the Doctor’s fingers flew across the keypads below the monitor, he barked out orders. Mickey instantly obeyed. A high pitched wail emanated from the center of the console, and the grating that formed the floor shook with an earsplitting rattle. The Time Rotor began to glow a sickly yellow-green.

Mickey ran around the console as rapidly as the Doctor usually did. It was exciting, even a little fun, until he couldn’t find one of the controls.

“Mickey, you need to flip the switch now!” the Doctor shouted, trying to be heard over the sounds of the shrieking TARDIS and the rattling floor.

“I can’t find it!” Mickey yelled back. 

“It’s right in front of you!”

Mickey stared at the panel again. Tubes, levers, a knob that could pull out, and a series of metal cups that looked like bells, all set in a panel glowing in the same sickly yellow-green of the Time Rotor. “It’s not here!” he insisted.

“It has to be!” The Doctor craned his neck and looked over the monitor at the panel on the opposite side of the console. “I just saw it… in his TARDIS.” The Doctor groaned. “The TARDIS must have moved it to a different location.” He glanced from side to side. “There it is!” He swung his foot up on top of the console and managed to flip the switch with the toe of his trainer before turning back to the monitor.

“Alright, Mickey, one last thing! Grab the mallet and hit the bells on the panel as hard as you can. Don’t hold back.”

Mickey grabbed the mallet. “In what order?”

“Doesn’t matter. Just do it!”

As Mickey began to whack the bells built into the control panel, the Doctor grabbed a lever and slowly pulled it down. The Time Rotor began to move, and the sound of the TARDIS dematerializing joined the other noises in the room.

“We did it!” Mickey shouted.

“We haven’t made it into the Time Vortex yet!” the Doctor answered. “Hang on!”

Mickey tightly grabbed a nearby handle set into the controls with both hands while the Doctor did the same on the opposite side of the console. The TARDIS lurched and the sounds of dematerialization died off. 

The rolling of the floor stopped.

The Time Rotor, now silent and glowing a bright blue-green, moved slowly up and down.

The Doctor grinned at Mickey, his brown eyes sparkling. Mickey grinned back.

“Now we did it,” the Doctor said. His grin widened, showing all his teeth, and he began to laugh. Mickey joined him.

“We did it!” Mickey yelled. He pumped his fist into the air.

“We did it!” the Doctor cried. “Ha!”


	24. Chapter Twenty-Three

**Chapter Twenty-Three—London, 28 July 2007**

Over the next couple of weeks John continued to receive nasty notes every day or so, usually shoved through the cat flap in the middle of the night. Like the first one, they were in an almost illegible scrawl, as if the writer was drunk while he was writing. What John was able to make out were mostly misspelled profanities and comments calling into question his sexual preference, his virility, his intelligence, his looks, even his parentage. He rolled his eyes at the messages, although he didn’t necessarily disagree with the description of his appearance. He also had no idea if his parents had been married when he was born, although why that would matter he had no idea.

After several days he narrowed the note sender down to two people, Rita’s ex-boyfriend Chuck and Rose’s ex, Jimmy, primarily because no one else he knew, neither in his block of flats nor at the garage, seemed upset with him for a change. That was a true rarity, since he knew that with his abrasive personality he seemed to piss people off wherever he went. 

After receiving the third note in a week, he questioned almost everyone he knew if any of them had seen either Jimmy or Chuck. Although everyone seemed to know who they were, none had seen Chuck since his last fight with Rita, and most were surprised to find out Jimmy was out of prison.

There were only three people he knew on the estate that he didn’t ask: Rose, Jackie, and Rita. He told himself he didn’t want to ask Rose because he didn’t want to worry her, but really it was because he didn’t want her involved in whatever this was. Both Chuck and Jimmy had a history of violence, and he wanted her as far out of it as she could be if this happened to take a bad turn. And Jackie he didn’t ask because she had a big mouth. He was sure the moment Jackie found out about the notes Rose would know, not because Jackie would want to tell her, but simply because she wouldn’t be able to help herself from letting something slip. 

Rita he didn’t ask for the most obvious reason; he didn’t know where she was. After she had left the flat with her brother the morning after the fight, she seemed to fall off the face of the Earth. If anyone knew where she was, they weren’t saying, which was probably a good thing, John thought. If no one on the estate knew where she was, Chuck probably didn’t know either. He hated to think what that piece of slime would do to her if he found her.

But beyond asking around about Chuck and Jimmy, for the most part he didn’t give the passive/aggressive note sender a lot of thought. Since whoever it was left notes in the middle of the night instead of confronting him in the light of day, it was obvious that he was a coward, and an illiterate one at that. John had better things to do than worry about the stupid ape. 

Like spend time with Rose.

Which he did every chance he got.

In addition to walking back and forth to work, which they did every day, on the weekend she went with him when he was repairing things around the estate, handing him tools and just generally keeping him company. 

When they weren’t at the garage and he wasn’t doing repairs, they usually went out, tramping all over London. Rose took him to all her favorite places in and around the city, some well-known tourist spots, others far off the beaten path. He could tell she enjoyed playing tour guide with him. Her eyes would sparkle and her grin widen while she told him the history or significance of one place or another. At some point while wandering the Tower of London—a place that seemed entirely too familiar, particularly since he didn’t recall ever being there—it occurred to him that while she’d traveled with the Doctor, the man had probably always been the one showing her around. It was obviously fun for her to be the one showing someone around instead.

But they didn’t spend all their spare time wandering London. This July was particularly chilly and wet, and when it was raining hard they stayed in, eating takeaway from one of the nearby restaurants and watching films on telly, everything from implausible thrillers to bad sci fi to Disney.

The only time they didn’t spend together was over the lunch hour. The day after their first official date, he had gone into the office to ask her to lunch only to be told that Rose had already left. Later he spotted her getting off the bus right before she returned to work. The next day was the same, as was every other day when it wasn’t raining. He wondered where she went over her lunch break. She never volunteered any information about where she was going or what she was doing. Despite his curiosity, after days of deliberation he decided not to ask her about it. After all, it wasn’t his business, he told himself firmly, and he didn’t want to ruin the fragile relationship he had with her by prying into her personal life. 

After one quiet evening spent eating a curry and watching the first Harry Potter film, he tried kissing her again but at the last second she turned her cheek to him, neatly deflecting it. He gave up after that, figuring that she didn’t want any more out of the relationship than they currently had. He didn’t blame her; he wasn’t exactly a prize. He had a disturbing tendency to be rude, not to mention he was broke, not particularly attractive, and much too old for her. After being initially disappointed by her reaction, it had taken him exactly three and a half seconds for him to decide that he’d rather have her in his life as a friend than not in his life at all because he had pushed things too far with her.

But in that three and a half seconds he wondered if it was even possible for him to just be her friend. Because he wanted her. Wanted her so much he ached, both in his heart and in his groin. Wanted her from the moment he saw her run down the stairs of her building every morning. Wanted her when he heard her voice while his head was buried under the bonnet of every vehicle he worked on in the garage. Wanted her while they walked home hand in hand after work. Wanted her while they explored London together. Wanted her while she snuggled against him while they watched telly.

Wanted her every time she smiled at him, whether in delight or teasingly, the tip of her tongue peeking out between her teeth.

He wanted to be surrounded by her intoxicating scent with the taste of her on his tongue and the feel of her skin on his lips while her mouth was on him or with him buried deep inside her.

But his desire for her was far more than sexual. He wanted to wake up with her in his arms. He wanted her face to be the first thing he saw in the morning. And he wanted to hold her in the middle of the night after dreams filled with screaming and fire.

But if it wasn’t to be, it wasn’t, and he would take, and gladly, anything she was willing to give, even though every second of every day he wanted more. But he was a big boy. He could cope with it.

But tonight would definitely test his resolve, he thought, as he grabbed his leather jacket and headed out the door.

~oOo~

In the tiny bathroom of her mother’s flat, Rose carefully traced her eyes with eyeliner.

“Aren’t you done yet?” Jackie called impatiently.

“Almost.” She switched to mascara, thickly coating her lashes with the stuff. 

“You know, you could do that in your room.”

“The light’s better in here,” she answered.

“Well, hurry up, because I need a shower before Stuart gets here.”

Rose ignored her. Although she always tried to look her best with hair and makeup, since they were headed to Susie and Rob’s wedding, tonight was special and she wanted everything perfect. Hair up and sprayed in place, makeup a little more dramatic than normal but still not as heavy as she had worn as a teenager, a sleeveless pink chiffon dress, matching heels. She had decided to forego the hat, partially because most of her friends wouldn’t be wearing one, and partially because she couldn’t afford the extra expense. She’d been lucky to find the dress, and on sale. She hadn’t brought one from the TARDIS—it hadn’t occurred to her that she’d need one—and for the first time she realized how spoiled she’d become having access to the TARDIS’s huge wardrobe room. 

“Hurry up, Rose!”

She rolled her eyes. Her mother usually spent twice as much time in the bathroom than she ever did. After putting on lipstick, she checked her teeth. Perfect.

She opened the door. 

“It’s about time,” her mother said. 

As her mother entered the bathroom, Rose returned to her bedroom to finish getting ready. First, a tiny bit of perfume on her throat and wrists. Then on went the hoop earrings she always wore and a gold colored bracelet around her wrist. Finally, the one luxury she’d packed in her rucksack before leaving the TARDIS, a pendant with a pink tinged stone that the Doctor had bought for her on a planet whose name she couldn’t pronounce. The necklace looked far too expensive to be owned by a girl from the estate, but it went perfectly with the dress and she couldn’t resist wearing it. 

At the knock on the door, she grabbed her TARDIS key off the dresser. Normally she only took it off to shower, but she hadn’t put it back on because she couldn’t wear it in this dress without it being noticed. But there was no way she’d ever leave it behind. After she considered putting it in her handbag or the pocket of her jacket, she finally tucked it into her bra.

When she opened the door, her jaw dropped. She figured he’d dress up a bit for the wedding, but she hadn’t expected this. Blue Oxford shirt, black trousers, his leather jacket… and a tie. She’d never seen this Doctor in a tie.

She’d always thought he was attractive, handsome even in an unconventional way, but she realized she’d been wrong.

He was gorgeous.

She stared at him, thinking about how the color of his shirt brought out the color of his eyes, making them a brilliant blue. 

He was staring at her as well, eyes wide, mouth slightly slack. 

“You look… beautiful,” he breathed.

And he hadn’t even qualified it with a “considering”. 

Suddenly shy, her heart pounded with nervousness, and the desire she had always felt for him and that she’d been trying to ignore over the past weeks rose to the surface with a vengeance. 

“Thanks,” she replied automatically, unable to tear her eyes away from him. 

She blinked, forcing herself to the present. He was still John. He was her best friend. There was no reason to be nervous, not really, no matter how gorgeous he was. And she could ignore how attracted she was to him, no matter how hard it was. After all, she had to.

She grinned at him mischievously. “Once you change out of that work shirt of yours, you clean up pretty good too.” 

It was evidently the right thing to say, because he laughed.

“Thanks.”

~oOo~

The ceremony was brief and to the point. Rob and Susie stood at the altar, the vicar said a few words, they said their vows, and they were married. They were in and out in fifteen minutes. John got the impression that all in attendance, including the bride and groom, considered it a warm up act for the main event.

The main event, of course, was the reception. Held in a large room over the pub where the groom’s mother worked, the long head table stood along one wall with smaller tables crowded around it. Near the stairs was a rectangular table filled with gifts, and at the other end of the room, there was a small dance floor.

With his hand on the center of her back, he escorted her across the room. On the way there Rose frequently stopped to talk to people. Slightly frustrated, he reminded himself that mingling was considered an important part of these sorts of things. To his surprise he found that there were a lot of people he recognized, and a number he actually knew, both from his block of flats and from the garage, despite never having met either the bride or the groom. Between conversations, he mentioned it to her quietly.

“Everyone knows everyone on the estate,” Rose whispered back. “If you’re there long enough you will too. Plus Rob used to work at the garage for a while.”

Minutes later they arrived at their seats. He was relieved to find that it was a narrow table for two shoved against one wall; he really wasn’t one for small talk and by now he’d had his fill.

Later, John sat back and watched as the newly married couple had their first dance. He frowned thoughtfully. Through the mingling, through the nibbles and the mediocre dinner and the best man’s speech, John had had a sense of… oddness. Everything—the wedding and the reception, the speech and the presents, the room with the masses of flowers and the dance floor—all seemed unfamiliar to him, like he had never attended anything like it before. The feeling was almost the reverse of déjà vu; instead of feeling like something was familiar that he didn’t remember, he felt like something was unfamiliar that should be. It was weird. He had assumed that due to his age he’d been married at some point. Even if he hadn’t, he figured that at least somewhere, at some point, he must have at least attended a wedding, but maybe he hadn’t. 

It was definitely a puzzle that needed solving.

Rose must have sensed his thoughts because she reached over and took his hand. “You alright?”

He plastered a wide grin on his face. “Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?”

“I dunno. Just figured this whole thing might be a little too domestic for you.”

His brow furrowed. She had said it again, called something domestic and suggested it was too much for him. She had done it several times in the past weeks, and he wondered why. Not that she was wrong, mind, she was right actually, but how would she even know that? He had meant to ask her but had never got around to it. Now was as good a time as any, he decided. 

Just as he opened his mouth to ask her about it, the song changed. She stood up. 

“Dance with me.” 

He snorted. It hadn’t been a request. More of an order, actually.

“Rose, I don’t dance,” he told her.

“Yes, you do,” she insisted. She dragged him to his feet.

He looked around to see if anyone was paying attention to them. No one was. He leaned towards her.

“Rose,” he said quietly, “I don’t think I know how.”

She stared at him, surprise written all over her face. She opened her mouth and then shut it, as if she was going to say something and then thought better of it. 

“Well then, I think it’s high time you learn,” she said finally.

“Rose,” he protested, but he allowed her to pull him to the crowded dance floor. 

To his relief, although the music was loud, it had a slow beat. He didn’t think he’d be able to cope with a fast song straight off, if at all. As it was, he still wasn’t quite sure what to do, so he just stood there, staring at her. She looked up, and as their eyes met, time stopped. The music, the laughter, the other people on the dance floor all faded into the distance. All he could hear was his own heartbeat, and all he could see was her: blonde hair threatening to escape from its upsweep, dark brown eyes looking into his soul, soft pink lips begging to be kissed…

She was so extraordinarily beautiful.

She licked her lips and looked away, and the moment was lost.

“Well, we can’t just stand here,” she said. 

She took his hands and placed them on her waist before putting her own behind his neck. She looked back up at him. She seemed to be waiting for something.

“What?”

“Uh, you need to move your feet.”

“Oh. Oh, right.”

Without conscious thought he pulled her close, and they began to sway to the music.

It was fantastic dancing with her, with her in his arms and her body pressed against his, her head on his shoulder and the scent of her perfume surrounding him. Why had he thought it was a bad idea? It was an absolutely fantastic idea.

They stayed that way for song after song, only stopping when a fast song began to play. He reluctantly let go of her as she began to pull away from him. 

“Sorry, I need the loo,” she said.

“I’ll go get us some drinks.” 

John went downstairs to the bar and placed his order. While he waited for their drinks, he grabbed some mixed nuts out of a bowl on the counter and turned around to lean with his back against the bar. He tossed them in his mouth and looked idly around the room. To his surprise, he saw Rita standing at the other end of the bar. She must have arrived late, he thought, because he was sure he would have noticed if she had been at the reception earlier. He scanned the room. No sign of Chuck, thank God, although he spotted her brother sitting with a girl at a table on the other side of the pub.

Rita was chatting with the bride and the maid of honor and didn’t seem to have seen him. He began to cross over to her to say hello but stopped when he heard them talking. 

Susie, he remembered. That was the bride’s name. But he couldn’t for the life of him remember the name of the other girl.

“So who is that she’s with?” Susie asked loudly. Although it was quieter down here than upstairs, it was still more than a bit noisy. 

Not above a bit of eavesdropping, he moved back to where he had been. With his ears, he still could hear them clearly.

“Didn’t you meet him?” Rita asked.

“Yeah, for just a second but I didn’t catch his name,” Susie answered. “You think it’s that bloke she was traveling with? Didn’t Keisha say she’d been traveling with an older bloke?”

“You mean the Doctor?” the maid of honor asked. “Could be.”

“What’s he look like?” Rita asked.

“I didn’t really get a good look at him,” Susie answered. She turned to the maid of honor. “How ‘bout you, Shareen?”

“Tall, short dark hair, blue eyes. Older,” Shareen answered. “Kinda big nose and ears, but good lookin’ anyway, if you like that sort of thing.”

“And you do,” Susie said.

“Shareen likes ‘em any way she can get ‘em,” Rita said. “She likes everyone in trousers, particularly when she’s got a couple of drinks in her.”

“Oi!” Shareen protested. When they turned to her, she grinned. “When I’ve had a couple of drinks, I like ‘em without trousers.”

They all laughed.

“Anyway, you think it was that Doctor bloke?” Susie asked.

“I thought it was,” Shareen answered. “You saw the way they were dancing.”

“That’s why I wasn’t sure,” Susie answered. “Because Rose said she and the Doctor weren’t like that, remember?”

Shareen snorted. “And you believed that?” She shook her head. “It’s amazing you’re in the condition you’re in, being so innocent an’ all.” She nodded her head at the bride’s belly. “What was it, an immaculate conception?”

They laughed again.

“But seriously, you think it’s him?” Susie asked.

“Sounds like my neighbor John to me,” Rita said. “All but the hair. After all, I know they’ve been hanging out together.”

“Oh, but what if John is the Doctor?” Shareen said excitedly. She waved her hands around, almost spilling her drink in the process. “Ooo, ooo, they’ve come back, but he’s in trouble for some reason, so he’s hidin’ out here on the estate and Rose is lookin’ after him.”

“How many of those have you had, Shareen?” Rita asked. “Somebody needs to cut you off.”

“Mark my words,” Shareen said solemnly. “I’m right. I know I am.”

“You’re an idiot, Shareen,” Susie said.

“I may be an idiot, but that doesn’t make me wrong.” 

“Sir, your drinks are ready.”

John started at the sound of the barman’s voice. He was standing opposite him and in front of him there was a whiskey and a glass of wine. John pulled out his wallet and passed the barman a couple of bills.

As he walked back up the stairs with the drinks, he wondered about what he had overheard. Was Shareen right? Was it possible he was the mysterious Doctor Rose had run off with? 

He rolled his eyes at even considering the idea. Shareen had been more than halfway to being completely pissed. She’d have to be, to come up with that crazy story. The whole idea was ridiculous. Him, Rose’s Doctor?

“Nah,” he said aloud.


	25. Chapter Twenty-Four

**Chapter Twenty-Four—London, 28 and 29 July 2007**

Back at their table, Rose watched as John ascended the stairs with their drinks: whiskey for him, white wine for her. She didn’t dare have anything stronger. Rather than easier, she was finding it more and more difficult to see him simply as John. It was more than his looks and his mannerisms and his frequent use of the words “fantastic” and “stupid ape”. The Doctor was part of everything he did, everything he was: his impatience with stupidity; his desire to help, and intervene for, those who needed it; his patience with lonely pensioners and overly excited children. And of course it was difficult to remember he was John when they went to repair things on the estate. It was the goofy torch he wore on his head while he worked. It was the way he looked when half shoved under a kitchen sink trying to fix a leaky pipe, with only his dark jean clad legs and heavy work boots visible. It was the way he’d ask her to hand him a spanner or a screwdriver or some other tool while making repairs, or the way he chatted easily about science and architecture, films and books and music and any other topic that sprang to mind. It was like being in the TARDIS with him all over again.

But it was more than that. It was the way he’d hold her hand. He’d grab her hand, holding tightly as they walked down a crowded street so they wouldn’t get separated, or squeezing it after they’d both had a difficult day at work, or intertwining their fingers and caressing the back of it with his thumb for no other reason than he wanted to. 

And more than anything it was the grin he gave her over a private joke, and the way he’d look at her like she was the only person in the world.

It was so difficult to remember he was John when he so clearly was the Doctor.

As he joined her at the table, he flashed her that grin, the grin he reserved for her and no one else, and her heart pounded, just as it had when she was nineteen and they had just begun traveling together. And frankly every other time he grinned at her. She grinned back.

“What took you so long?” she asked.

For the tiniest instant his grin faded into a frown and then returned to a wide smile. She would have missed it if she hadn’t known him so well. 

“Queue at the bar,” he told her as he sat down.

She didn’t believe him for a second and wondered what the real reason was.

~oOo~

The reception dragged as Rose caught up with some of her old friends from school. Some of them remarked that they didn’t know she was back, but most of them said they were surprised to see her there since they had heard that someone named Mickey had killed her.

For a while John sat back and listened, hoping for more information beyond what she had already told him about the time she had been missing, but every time someone mentioned it she quickly turned the conversation to other topics.

Eventually when anyone new joined them John’s eyes would glaze over, and he’d make an excuse to leave, stating he was going to refresh their drinks or to talk to someone he knew from the estate or from the garage. He excused himself to go to the loo so many times that he began to worry that Rose would think he had a prostate problem.

After that he gave up on making excuses. When someone approached he just left. 

Until the best man began to cross the room, headed towards them. He was tall, blond, and good looking enough to be on the cover of GQ. Or Playgirl. Most of all, the bloke was much closer to Rose’s age than he was. John scowled. 

And then he slowly smiled.

Before the handsome bloke could join them, John grabbed her hand and pulled her to her feet.

“Come on,” he ordered. 

“Where are we…” she began. And then her face lit up as he spun her onto the dance floor.

When the song ended she backed away from him, obviously expecting them to return to the table, and he pulled her back into his arms. A look of surprise crossed her face, and then she melted into his arms and laid her head on his shoulder. 

A very good sign, he thought, momentarily forgetting his decision not to press her into a closer relationship.

Perhaps a half an hour and seven songs later, she pulled away again.

“Thirsty,” she told him. 

As soon as they returned to their table, the maid of honor—Shareen he remembered from the conversation downstairs—and the best man joined them. They were each carrying a drink, a half empty pint for him while hers was a glass of something that was a fluorescent blue. 

The blond bloke set his glass down and grabbed a couple of chairs from a nearby table. 

Shareen plopped herself down on one. “Steve, you remember Rose,” she said.

“How could I forget?” he said as he sat down. He flashed a grin at Rose, revealing perfect, white teeth.

John shot him a dark look.

Shareen turned to him, her mouth twisted into a mischievous grin. “What did you say your name was?”

“John,” he answered.

“Damn!” she said. “I owe Rita ten quid. We bet that you were—”

Rose interrupted her. “John, this is Shareen.” She turned back to her. “So you saw Rita? Where is she?”

Shareen turned to her. “Oh, she had to take off. She was here with Joe and his girlfriend what’s-her-name. They only stayed for a couple of minutes because she didn’t want to risk running into that piece of shit Chuck.” She turned back to face John. “Are you sure you aren’t—” 

“So, Steve,” Rose said, interrupting her again. “What have you been up to?”

Before Steve could answer, Shareen grinned cheekily.

“I’m guessing about eight inches,” she said, “but I’m sure I’ll find out for sure later.” She tossed her drink back and slammed the glass on the table. Then she leaned over and squeezed Steve’s thigh. With a smirk he reciprocated, causing her to giggle.

She turned back to John. “Anyway, Rita and I had this bet goin’, and she said that you were her neighbor, John, and I said—”

“What time is it?” Rose interjected. “It must be getting late.”

Steve glanced at his watch. “Looks like it’s half one.”

“Wow, it’s later than I thought,” she said. She stood up abruptly, almost knocking over her chair. “We’ve really got to get going. Don’t we, John?” Before he could respond, she continued. “Really nice to see you again, Steve.”

She grabbed John’s hand and pulled him out of his chair, across the room and down the stairs before he could get a word in.

“What’s with you?” John asked as they dodged people in the pub on their way to the door. “Is she a childhood enemy or something?”

“No, actually she’s one of my best friends,” she answered.

He stared at her incredulously. “How do you treat your enemies?”

“Believe me, you don’t want to know,” she said as she pulled him out the door.

Outside the temperature had dropped and there was a heavy mist in the air. Rose shivered. John automatically pulled his jacket off and wrapped it around her shoulders.

“Thanks,” she said, slipping her arms into the sleeves. 

John took her hand, and they headed towards the Audi they had taken to the wedding. He didn’t own his own car; instead he had borrowed one from Arthur Mudali. Their boss had a couple of cars for hire that he kept for customers whose own cars were in the shop. Mudali typically didn’t loan them out to staff, but John was his best mechanic. He didn’t want to lose him to another garage, so it didn’t take much for John to persuade his boss to make an exception.

Since it was Saturday night, between the regular pub goers and the wedding guests, they’d had to park a couple of blocks away, and by the time they got into the car the mist had turned into a drizzle. John turned the key in the ignition.

It didn’t start.

In fact, it didn’t even try to turn over. He tried again. Dead silence.

He frowned.

“What’s wrong?” Rose asked.

“I don’t know,” he told her. “Sounds like the battery’s dead. Did the lights come on when we got in?”

“I didn’t really notice.”

He reached up to turn on the overhead light, but it didn’t turn on.

“You leave the headlights on?” she teased.

“Didn’t have them on,” he said seriously. “It was still light out when we got here. Could be the alternator’s bad. On the other hand, if we’re lucky the battery cable’s just loose. Hand me the torch. It’s in the glove compartment.” She passed him the torch, and he popped open the bonnet. “Stay here,” he said as he got out of the car. 

She followed him, and he shot her a look.

“I have no idea why I thought you’d listen,” he said. 

She grinned at him. “I don’t know either.”

“Must have been a case of momentary insanity.”

“Only momentary?”

He shot her another look. She was giving him a cheeky grin, with the tip of her tongue curling up to touch her upper teeth, and as he stuck his head under the bonnet, his mouth twitched as he tried to hold back a smile of his own.

“Hmm, not the battery cable,” he said as he shined the torch at the engine. 

The rain grew harder. He slammed the bonnet shut, and they got back into the car. 

“Now what?” she asked.

“Well, I’m not going to figure out what’s wrong in the dark, and even if I could, I couldn’t fix it here. We could try to jump the engine, but it might not work. Not to mention that no one’s around, and there’s no sense trying to get a tow at two in the morning.” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “The buses don’t run this late. We should get a taxi.”

She stuck out her hand. “Give me your mobile.”

“You need to get a new one,” he said as he handed it to her.

“Why should I when I can just use yours?” she asked cheekily as she typed in a number.

“Just don’t put her on speed dial.”

“Why not? She’s got your number on hers.” 

A pained expression crossed his face. “You really need to get a new phone.”

She held a finger to her lips.

“Hi, Mum,” she said. She fell silent for a moment. “Yeah, it was great.” As she listened, she looked at John and rolled her eyes. “Yeah, she was gorgeous, and no, you couldn’t tell she was pregnant. Listen, where are you and Stuart? Because the car’s dead and we need a ride.” She paused again. “Oh. Never mind then. If you can’t, you can’t. I’ll see you later, yeah?”

She rang off. “His car’s too small to fit all of us.”

“Taxi it is then. Give me the mobile back.”

As she handed the phone back to him, she stared out the window. “It’ll take a half an hour for it to get here, easy. We’re only about a mile from our flats, yeah?” 

“About that. Maybe a little less.” He stared at her as he realized what she was thinking. “Rose, it’s pouring out there.”

She gave him a crooked, mischievous grin. “So?”

“We can’t walk that in this weather,” he protested.

She jumped out of the car and stuck her head back inside. “Who said anything about walking?” 

He got out and joined her. He shook his head. “Now who’s the crazy one?” 

Her eyes sparkled as she grabbed his hand.

“Run!” 

She tugged on his hand, and they tore down the pavement, but before they got more than a block she pulled him to a stop. 

“Hold on.” She let go of his hand and pulled off one shoe.

“You’re not going to be able to run that far barefoot,” he said, having to raise his voice over the sound of the storm.

She snorted as she pulled off the other. “Believe me, I’m used to it.” 

With her shoes in one hand and his hand in the other, she took off again, pulling him along.

To his amazement, despite his much longer legs he didn’t have to keep his speed in check. She easily kept up with him as they rounded corners and took shortcuts down alleys.

The rain was coming down in sheets as they neared the garage. Large puddles had formed on low places on the pavement while part of the road itself had turned into a fast moving stream about four feet wide and at least several inches deep.

He let go of her hand and easily jumped it. He turned back when he realized she hadn’t immediately followed. 

“What’s wrong?” he yelled.

“I don’t really want to wade it, but I’m not sure I can jump it,” she called back. “I’m not exactly as tall as you.”

“You can make it,” he said encouragingly. “And if you don’t, I’ll catch you.”

She nodded. She backed up several feet, ran and jumped.

He caught her neatly in his arms and set her down. He grabbed her hand.

“Run!” he said. 

Laughing, they ran the rest of the distance to Bucknall House.

Once inside the entrance to the stairwell, they looked out the window at the heavy rain still coming down.

“That was fun,” she said, as she squeezed water out of her dripping hair. 

He turned to her, a wide grin on his face. “Rose Tyler, I don’t know anyone else who wouldn’t complain about the car breaking down and then would suggest running a mile in a downpour instead of waiting for a taxi. And barefoot no less,” he said, admiration filling his voice. “You’re fantastic. Absolutely fantastic.”

She bit her lip shyly. “Thanks.”

She looked up at him. Wide dark brown eyes met the steel blue of his own. His grin faded, and for the second time that night he almost forgot his resolution to keep their relationship platonic.

His eyes dropped to her mouth. The tip of her tongue was tracing her lips, as if in anticipation. He unintentionally mimicked her and began to lean towards her…

And then jerked himself to a halt, reminding himself of all the times she’d stopped him from kissing her. She didn’t want this, and he didn’t want to ruin their friendship.

He turned away from her to look out the window. “I think the rain’s letting up a bit.”

“Uh, yeah, I think it is,” she said brightly. “Um… thanks for the use of your coat.” She slipped it off and handed it to him.

“Any time. How are your feet?” 

“They’re fine,” she said. “In better condition than these shoes.” She glanced down at them. “I’m gonna have to bin them. The dress too, I think.”

He automatically looked down at it. Despite her having worn his coat, the entire dress top to bottom was soaked from the rain. It clung to her like a second skin, revealing her slim waist and the soft curves of her breasts, bum, and thighs. 

He swallowed hard and quickly looked up at her face, hoping she hadn’t caught him staring.

“Do you… do you wanna come up?” she asked hesitantly.

He glanced back down, at the once opaque material that had gone sheer. He could see the outline of a lace bra and knickers, and a hint of dusty pink areolas and erect nipples. His mouth went dry.

“No, better not,” he said in a low voice. Then he flashed her a manic grin. “You need to get into some warm, dry clothes.”

“Uh, yeah, you too. You’ll catch your death.”

“Me? Nah. Takes more than a little rain to make me sick. Superior physiology.” 

She laughed quietly. 

“Well, I’d better not keep you,” she said. “Don’t want you to get sick, superior physiology or not.”

She turned to go, and he stopped her.

“Rose, thanks for inviting me. I had a very nice time.”

She smiled at him. “Me too.”

He leaned forward and kissed her forehead. “G’night.”

“Night.”

As he slipped on his jacket, he watched her walk up the stairs. Then he headed back out into the rain.

~oOo~

The flat was dark when Rose entered, but just in case she called out to her mum to tell her she was home. As she expected, there was no answer.

After binning her shoes, she grabbed a bath towel and began to dry her hair on the way to her room.

He’d been about to kiss her, she was sure of it. But he had stopped himself.

No, she had stopped him herself, by holding him at arm’s length the last couple of weeks.

She had had to. It was the right thing to do, she told herself. 

Wasn’t it?

Even if it was, she couldn’t help but feel incredibly disappointed.

She dropped her sodden clothes on the bedroom floor and slowly dressed, first pulling on a t-shirt and then sweat pants over dry knickers. She grabbed a pair of socks.

In the lounge she dropped cross-legged onto the sofa and examined her feet. Despite her response to John, her feet were a little sore, although much less so than most other people’s would be. She was telling the truth there. She had to run all the time while traveling with the Doctor, mostly in trainers, but frequently barefoot.

Besides being dirty, the soles of her feet had a few cuts and a small amount of gravel embedded in them. She laughed ruefully. Even with sore feet, running barefoot in the streets of London in the pouring rain was probably the most fun she’d had since she’d got here. Oh, they’d had fun sightseeing and watching telly and dancing at the reception, but running in the rain was so them. While they ran hand in hand, she’d almost forgotten about everything that had brought her here: the TARDIS, the fob watch, the Doctor being John. For those moments it was just the Doctor and Rose again, running for their lives, only without the monsters. 

She got a damp flannel and some ointment and set about doctoring her feet. She was just slipping on her thick, white socks when she heard the door open.

“Mum, is that you?” 

When she didn’t get an answer she got up and walked into the hallway. 

Her mother was standing by the door, staring at a piece of paper in her hand. She didn’t respond.

“Mum? Where’s Stuart?” When her mum didn’t answer, Rose crossed over to her. “Mum, what is that?” 

Jackie jumped. She hurriedly put the paper behind her back. “Rose, you startled me. I didn’t know you were there.”

“I’ve been calling you,” she answered. “What is that?”

“Nothing!”

“It’s not nothing.” Rose reached around her and grabbed the paper out of her hands. Although most was illegible, what she could read was vile: threats and obscenities and crude, disgusting drawings. “Where did this come from?” she demanded.

“Oh, Rose, I didn’t want you to see that,” her mother said.

“Where did you get this?” Rose asked slowly and firmly.

“It… it was shoved in the door, same as the other ones.”

“What other ones?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Jackie said.

“Yes, it does. How many of these have you gotten?”

“Dunno. Maybe a dozen over the last couple of weeks.”

“What! And you didn’t tell me?”

“I didn’t want you to know.”

Rose opened her mouth to argue, and then shut it as something her mother said clicked.

“Hold on, you say it was shoved in the door?”

“Yeah, same as the others.”

“But I’ve only been home five minutes, and it wasn’t there when I got here.”

Jackie blanched. “Oh my God, I must have seen him. I passed someone on the stairs just now. He was going down while I was coming up.”

Rose’s eyes widened. “Stay here!” she ordered. Still clutching the note, she ran out of the flat. 

It was pouring again. Through the rain she spotted a hooded figure crossing the courtyard. “Oi! Stop!”

The figure looked up and then began to run.

She flew down the stairs.

~oOo~

Just as he finished getting dressed, John’s mobile rang. He glanced at the number.

“Hello, Rose?”

“No, it’s Jackie! Rose is in trouble! She just took off after someone who’s been threatening me!” 

Jackie sounded terrified, and John’s brain kicked into high gear. “Don’t worry. I’m on my way.”

He shoved his phone in his pocket and ran out of the flat. From the walkway outside his flat, he could see Rose erupting from her building and running across the courtyard.

“Rose!” he yelled, but she ignored him.

He took the stairs two at a time. When that wasn’t quick enough he swung over the railing, skipping over landings and entire flights of stairs. He ran out of his building just as Rose was leaving the courtyard. 

“Rose!”

He followed her out of the courtyard, only catching up with her on the street.

“Damn it, I lost him!” she said angrily. “Where the hell did he go?”

“Are you all right?” he asked.

“I’m fine,” she snapped.

“Thank God,” he said, ignoring her tone. He pulled out his mobile. “Jackie? Yeah, she’s fine. Listen… No, listen! Is there someone who could come and stay with you tonight? Or better yet, is there someone you could stay with?” He paused. “That’s perfect.” Another pause. “No, I’ll take her home with me. Don’t worry, I’m gonna get to the bottom of this.”

As he shoved his phone in his pocket he turned to Rose. “What on Earth were you thinking, chasing after someone alone in the middle of the night like that?” he snapped. “Don’t you know how dangerous that is?”

“Someone is threatening my mum!” she told him. “She’s been getting threatening notes for weeks! No one threatens my mum! And I almost caught him too!”

“And what would you have done with him once you got him?” he asked. She didn’t answer. “You don’t know, do you? You should have called me.”

She glared at him. “There wasn’t time! He was right there! And I almost had him!” She let out a cry of frustration. “Damn it, damn it, damn it!” she swore. She looked up and down the street. It was empty. 

“He’s not here, Rose,” he said. “There’s no sense staying.” He grabbed her hand and yanked her back in the direction of his building. She followed reluctantly, muttering under her breath.

Once they were in his flat with the door closed, he noticed the slip of paper she was clutching in her hand. “Give it here.”

She thrust it at him. 

He swore under his breath. It was so wet it was illegible. “That’s no help.” He dropped it on the table.

She held her hand out to him. 

“Give me your phone,” she ordered. “I’ve got to call my mum.”

“No,” he told her firmly. “You’re too upset. You’ll just scare her more than she already is. I’ll call her.”

While he spoke to Jackie, on the other side of the room, Rose sat down on the sofa and pulled off her soggy socks. “I’m gonna have to bin these too,” she muttered. Instead, she dropped them on the floor.

He rang off and sat down next to her. She jumped back up and began to pace the room. 

“Why are we here? We should be protecting my mum,” she said.

He stood up again. “Stuart’s coming to pick her up,” he told her. “He’s gonna take her to his place.”

“Then we should be out finding that… that… piece of shit who was threatening her.” She ran her hands through her hair in frustration. “Damn it! No one, no one, no one threatens my mum and gets away with it!”

“Whoever it was wasn’t threatening Jackie, Rose,” he said, trying to keep an even tone to his voice. He wasn’t entirely successful. “They were trying to scare you.”

She whirled on him. “What?” she said. “How do you know that?

“Stands to reason. I’ve been getting notes too.”

“You’ve been… Why the hell didn’t you tell me?” she demanded.

“I wanted to keep you out of it.” She stared at him. “I was trying to protect you!” he snapped.

“Protect me? You don’t need to protect me! You can’t just wrap me in cotton wool, John!” she spat. “You have no idea what I’ve been through! I’m a big girl! I can take care of myself!”

“That’s not the point!”

“Then what is the point?”

“You need to use your head!” he exploded. “You don’t know what this person wants. He probably wants to hurt you. He could even want to kill you! It’s just stupid to take off on your own like that! Next time, before you go off half-cocked, you tell me!”

“You aren’t my father!” she shouted. “You don’t get to tell me what to do!”

His eyes flashed. “Oh, I know I’m not your father, Rose Tyler. Don’t you ever make that mistake!” 

In an instant he closed the distance between them, cupped her face in his hands and covered her mouth with his own in a hard, possessive, almost brutal kiss. 

She froze.

As he felt her stiffen he let go of her—almost pushing her away—and staggered backwards. They stared at one another in shock. 

“I’m sorry,” he said, panting. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

She closed the distance between them. 

“Oh, oh, yes you should have,” she said in a low voice. She grabbed his shirt, yanked him closer and kissed him back.  
 


	26. Chapter Twenty-Five

**Chapter Twenty-Five—London, 29 July, 2007**

It took the space of seven beats of his pounding heart before his brain could comprehend what was happening.

He’d kissed Rose.

And now she was kissing him back.

No, she was snogging the life out of him.

It took three additional heartbeats for him to realize he should be responding.

Once his brain kicked in, he tightly wrapped his arms around her, crushing her to his chest, and kissed back in a clash of teeth and lips that was almost painful in intensity. 

To say that the kiss was heated was so far from the reality it might as well have been in a different galaxy. It was a raging fire between them, a supernova that threatened to consume them both.

They were standing with Rose’s back against the wall before he realized that they had moved. Somewhere deep in his mind he wondered how they had got there. And then didn’t care because she had slipped her hands underneath his shirt and was digging her fingers into his back. 

And then he was slipping one hand underneath her top to cup her breast while his mouth moved to her throat.

She wrapped a leg around his hip, pulling him closer, and kissed everywhere she could reach—neck, shoulder, hair. The partial erection he had whenever he was around her hit him full force. He quickly moved his hand from her breast to her thigh to hold her in place and then thrust against her, the soft material of their sweatpants providing almost no barrier between them. The feeling was fantastic, so he did it again. But it wasn’t enough.

It wasn’t nearly enough.

She moaned and tightened her calf around his waist, tilting her hips and pressing, rubbing, thrusting back.

The sound brought him back to himself. This was happening too fast. If it wasn’t for the clothes they were wearing they’d already be shagging against the door. And not five minutes ago he would have sworn she didn’t want to change their relationship. But after the events of the evening, first with the reception and then with the note writer, emotions were running high for both of them. He didn’t want them to do anything that she would regret later.

He let go of her leg and pulled away from her slightly, forcing her to put her foot back on the floor. As they both panted, he pressed his forehead against hers. He closed his eyes and took slow, deep breaths, trying to slow his racing heart.

“Maybe I should… Maybe we shouldn’t… Rose, if you don’t want this, really want this, you can just go in the bedroom and close the door. I’ll sleep on the sofa, and in the morning we can go back to the way we were, pretend that this never happened.”

“Oh, God,” she whispered breathlessly. “God, if you had any idea…”

He opened his eyes and met hers.

“Believe me, I want this,” she told him. “I’ve wanted you ever since I met you.”

John’s jaw dropped. The vehemence, the raw honesty in her voice stunned him. 

But there was also a note of something else. Brow furrowed thoughtfully, he stared at her, searching her face. Despite the frankly magnificent snog—and everything else—they had just shared, he still saw a flicker of uncertainty there, as if she wasn’t sure what his reaction might be to her admission. 

After what had just happened, how could she not know how he felt about her?

He gave her a small, crooked grin. “Oh, Rose Tyler, me too.”

She smiled back at him, her face lit up with happiness and relief.

And then she pulled away from him. 

And took his hand.

And led him into the bedroom.

~oOo~

Despite how much time she had spent in John’s flat, Rose had never been in his bedroom. The closest she had come was peeking in from the doorway to see a small, tidy space containing barely more than the essentials yet still filled to capacity with furniture, most of which she knew was only there because no one else wanted it. A long, wide bed, suitable for someone his height, dominated the room. It was flanked by mismatched bedside tables. Even from the door she had seen that they were both badly worn. Lamps that looked so out of fashion they probably had been old before her mother was born sat atop them. On the far wall was a window framed by curtains that had been originally blue but had faded to a sickly grey. Opposite the bed was an ancient chest of drawers and, incongruously, on a low table in the corner sat a state of the art computer system. 

The room actually seemed to suit him in an odd way. The blending of beat up old furniture and high tech equipment reminded her a bit of the TARDIS console room.

The window had been cracked open. As the cool night air filtered into the room, she remembered her clothes were still damp from being out in the rain. She shivered.

“Cold?”

“A bit.” She began to pull off her top and he stopped her, laying his large hands over her smaller ones. She look up and met his eyes.

“Let me,” he said in a low voice.

Without breaking her gaze, she obediently lifted her arms. He pulled her shirt over her head and dropped it on the floor. Cupping her face, he again lowered his head to hers. 

She slipped her hands under his t-shirt again, this time to feel the toned muscles of his abdomen and chest. The feel of his skin against the palms of her hands did nothing to satisfy her craving for him. If anything, it served to increase it. She grabbed his t-shirt in order to yank it off. 

It got stuck. 

Chuckling, he pulled it off himself, dropping it on the floor next to hers. 

“Better?” he asked.

“Not yet,” she told him. She moved her hands to his waistband and her mouth to his throat. 

“Slow down,” he said, amusement in his voice. 

“No,” she said flatly. “Wanted this too long. I am done waiting.”

“Can’t argue with that.”

Still holding on to his waistband, she backed up until her knees hit the back of the bed. She sat down and pulled him down to sit next to her. John cupped her face in his hands and kissed her slowly, leisurely, as he eased her down onto her back and lay down next to her.

His kiss was soft. Gentle. Perfect. Half remembered dream images flashed through her mind, of light, of singing, of a gentle, perfect kiss given and received, beautiful images of him kissing her exactly like this.

But that had been a dream. This was real.

With a low groan of pleasure, he deepened the kiss. Tongues touched as lips slid against lips. Hands explored naked skin, at first tentatively and then with more confidence.

Competing urges warred within her. It had been so long since she’d shagged anyone. The last person had been Mickey, and she had no idea how long ago that had been. Traveling in the TARDIS messed with her sense of personal linear time. She had no idea if she’d been gone for one year or two, and whatever it had been had no relation to how time had passed on the estate so she couldn’t go by that.

However long it had been, it had been pure torture. Living in close quarters with a dead sexy man—both before and after his regeneration—whom she loved but couldn’t touch was enough to drive her spare. Although she’d had been tempted to relieve the tension—with Adam, with Jack, with Mickey—she never did. It was only the Doctor she wanted. Only the Doctor she could ever imagine wanting.

Just minutes earlier, fueled by the desire of years with him, she’d wanted him to shag her so hard and fast against the wall that the whole building shook. And now that she was actually here half naked and in bed with him she wanted... well, she wanted to strip him, flip him onto his back and do things to him that would make even Shareen blush. 

But at the same time, she wanted this to last. Wanted to be like this, just like this, the two of them lying side by side and touching and kissing and caressing forever. She didn’t want this moment that she had waited so long for to ever end. 

He mapped out a path downward with his lips, placing openmouthed kisses to her jawline, to her throat, to that oh, so sensitive spot at her pulse point. She sighed as he continued lower, creating a path with his lips and teeth and tongue down to her breast. 

She reached down to caress his overly large ears, delicately tracing the outer edges with her fingertips. It was something she had always wanted to do but had never dared. He froze in place. She smiled as she was rewarded with a quiet groan of pleasure.

After a moment he moved again, now to suck one of her nipples in his mouth. With a sigh of contentment, her eyes fluttered shut.

“So good,” she breathed.

Seeking more, she arched her back, thrusting her breast towards him, and he obliged, gently tugging and flicking the nipple with his tongue. Resting his weight on one elbow, he squeezed her other breast, rolling the nipple between his fingers. 

“Yeah, like that,” she whispered, nodding. “Just like that.”

Instead, she felt his hand drop from her breast. His fingers lightly traced a path down her ribs and belly to the wide waistband of her sweatpants. He toyed with it for a moment before slipping his hand underneath. 

At the same time a shock of cool air struck her nipple. She opened her eyes to see he had pulled away from her. He was giving her that look again, the dark, sensual look that went deep into her soul. Her heart raced, beating so hard it threatened to pound right out of her chest.

His mouth returned to hers. Tongues danced as his fingertips moved lower. They skimmed over the top of her knickers before plunging inside. A rush of liquid warmth flowed through her. She made a needy sound and pushed her hips upward against his hand. 

One long finger dipped inside her. She nearly cried out when his fingertip grazed against the perfect spot as he withdrew it. 

She bent her knee and dropped it to the side, wordlessly urging him on, and he continued, adding a second finger to the first. He eased them deep inside her before withdrawing again. They were joined by a third, gently stretching her.

Preparing her for him.

She was so close that that thought alone was almost enough to push her over the edge. She grabbed the duvet on either side of her and clutched it tightly in her hands.

And then he flicked his thumb against her clit.

She shattered into a million pieces.

As she gasped for air, he continued to stroke her, drawing out her orgasm far longer than she could have ever imagined possible. 

Once she had caught her breath, he slowly pulled the rest of her clothes off. Too exhausted for the moment to move, she watched as he removed his own sweatpants. In the dim light of the room she caught a glimpse of him, strong, lean, and heavily aroused. 

She knew she wouldn’t come again, not after the incredible, mind blowing orgasm she’d just had, but she wanted, craved for him to be inside of her. 

As her legs fell further apart, he moved to kneel between her thighs. For a moment he hovered over her, his elbows on either side of her head, his erection pressing against her where his hand had been only moments earlier. He stared into her eyes, and she stared back, powerless to do anything else.

And then with one quick thrust he was buried deep within her. 

She wrapped her arms around his back and her calves around his thighs. Wanting nothing more than for it to be good for him, she lifted her hips, allowing him to slip in deeper.

He let out a low groan of pleasure. 

She kissed his shoulder and lightly scratched his back with her nails. 

Slowly he withdrew and then pushed forward again. As he moved, he rested his weight on one elbow. Cupping her face in his free hand, he returned his mouth to hers. As they kissed, his fingertips moved to trace the outline of her face. He paused for a moment when he reached her temple, applying gentle pressure there. After a moment he moved on, this time to thread his fingers in her hair before going back to rest his elbow on the bed.

He set a leisurely pace, a slow movement forward and back as he moved deeper still, hitting places she hadn’t even known she had. To her astonishment she felt the familiar tension begin again, an ember sparking deep within her, quickly starting a fire that spread outward, downward, setting her nerves ablaze. 

She wanted… she needed to come… no, she needed… something, something more than that, something she couldn’t name, but she knew she needed it… it was there, just out of reach… light and sound and music and energy and—

“Oh, God,” she cried.

In desperation she wantonly clutched at him, finally digging her fingernails into his arse, begging him to move faster, harder, anything, everything…

He quickened the pace as she pleaded, harder and harder, faster and faster—for seconds or hours, she couldn’t tell which—and then he was pounding into her over and over and over. His movements became wild, erratic, until with a shout he arched his back and pulsed into her, carrying her over with him.

And in ecstasy she exploded with a brilliant golden light. 

~oOo~

John awoke to the early morning sounds of the estate filtering in through the window and to a sleeping Rose Tyler in his arms. He smiled. Gently he tightened his arm around her and placed a kiss on the crown of her head, astounded by the fact she was there, naked in his bed.

That they had made love.

It had been the most incredible, the most fantastic, mind-blowing experience of his life.

As he replayed the incredible events in his mind, his smile faded. He frowned thoughtfully. When he had first entered her, he remembered placing his fingertips on her temple for a moment, seeking… something. Craving something.

Something he wanted to share with Rose. 

Something he knew he’d never be able to articulate, something he didn’t understand.

Something far beyond the physical desire he felt. An impossible mental, emotional, heart-to-heart, soul-to-soul touching. 

Something he was certain didn’t even exist.

But then in the midst of making love to her he had almost felt it, a flicker of something that remained just out of reach and then disappeared.

He yawned widely. It had just been his imagination, he told himself as he drifted back to sleep. Whatever it had been.


	27. Chapter Twenty-Six

**Chapter Twenty-Six – London, 29 July, 2007, and the Time Vortex, twenty-nine hours after leaving the Powell estate**

_Despite his awkward earlier attempts, she should have known he could dance. His long-limbed runner's body had an athlete's grace, and it showed as he expertly steered her around the crowded dance floor._

_She rested her head on his shoulder, enjoying the feel of the soft leather of his jacket underneath her cheek. He planted a kiss on the top of her head._

_The music changed. They were dancing around the TARDIS console to_ In the Mood _. Her mother and father, dressed as they had been for their wedding, stood against the wall of the console room and watched, identical smiles for them on their faces. Nearby, Shareen danced with Mickey and Susie danced with her new husband._

_As the song ended, he twirled her back into his arms and lowered her into a deep dip. With her head thrown back, she spotted Jack looking on. He had an eyebrow raised in interest, an expression that was quickly replaced with a smirk of amusement._

_Jack's image flickered, stretched, thinned. For an instant, his perfectly styled hair grew darker, messier. His white shirt, braces, and dark trousers became brown pinstripes._

_Then he disappeared._

_Then they were alone, running hand-in-hand through the corridors of the TARDIS. For a moment she thought it was odd that rain was pouring down on them from above. She looked up to see dark clouds in the sky overhead and then caught him grinning down at her, his blue – no, brown – no, blue – eyes sparkling._

_The rain stopped. He stood before her, as naked as she suddenly realized she was. She traced her fingers across his bare chest. And then he pulled her into his arms._

_Arms and legs intertwined, skin against naked skin, they were moving in unison on the bed in the most intimate of dances. As he pressed forward, closer and closer, deeper and deeper, she tightened her calves around his thighs and lifted her hips to meet his._

_She moaned._

_He thrust harder into her. Desire, want, need coiled deep inside her, spreading down to her sex and racing through her body to toes, fingers, face, and as ecstasy overtook her she cried out his name._

_Out of the corner of her eye she saw a glimpse of brown pinstripes and messy brown hair. She turned her head._

_And saw the Doctor watch expressionlessly as John buried himself deep inside her._

With a gasp she jerked herself awake, her skin still tingling from the orgasm she'd had in her sleep. She found herself wrapped around John with her face plastered against his shoulder. Her arm was draped across his chest and her leg across his hips while his arm was tightly wrapped around her. His breathing was slow and even.

Oh Lord, what had she done?

She'd been caught up in the moment when they'd –

No, that was a lie. She'd known exactly what she was doing. John had wanted her and she'd wanted him so she shagged him, not caring about the consequences.

But it had been John who had wanted her. Not the Doctor. The Doctor didn't want her that way.

What would he do if he remembered this?

Maybe he wouldn't remember. After all, before he'd left he hadn't remembered anything from this time in his life.

Maybe he'd never know.

But she'd know. And every time he looked at her she'd remember.

She'd remember his kisses, his caresses, his making love to her.

Oh God, what had she done?

He stirred and his morning erection pressed hard against her thigh. Desire roared to life within her. She fought her body's instinct to rub herself wantonly against him.

No, she told herself firmly. She disentangled herself from his embrace and abruptly sat up. Behind her she could hear John yawn.

"Rose?"

"Morning," she said without turning, forcing herself to sound cheerful. Her eyes prickled, and she blinked rapidly, trying not to cry. She was only partially successful. Without meaning to, she sniffed loudly.

She felt the bed shift as he sat up behind her. He placed a hand on her arm.

"Rose, what is it? What's wrong?" he asked.

She pressed her fist tightly against her mouth in an effort to compose herself. It didn't work.

"Nothing." Her answer came out unnaturally high.

"You're lying." He paused for a moment. "Tell me the truth. You regret it."

His voice was flat, devoid of emotion, the way this him reacted when deeply hurt. She realized he thought she was rejecting him. She couldn't bear it, couldn't bear the thought of causing him any more pain than he'd already had in his life, even if he didn't remember it.

She turned to face him.

"No," she told him. "No, I don't."

And then she realized it was true. No matter what the consequences to her, even if he ended up hating her, even if he never forgave her, she couldn't bring herself to regret it.

She loved him, and if this had been the only chance she had to show him, she'd never regret it.

He stared at her, a puzzled expression on his face. "Then what is it?"

"It's just…" She chewed on her lip. "It's just… I'm afraid you will."

"What? Rose, I'm not going to—" he began.

She interrupted him. "But you could. I mean… what if you found out something, something about yourself, something from your past…" She took a deep breath. "Like, what if you found out you're, I dunno, uh, married or… or… something…"

He took her hands in his. "There's no one out there, I told you that," he said. "I looked for months. But even if there was–"

"But—" she began.

"Even if there was," he continued slowly. "I wouldn't regret it." He cupped her cheek in one hand and looked deeply into her eyes. "Rose Tyler, believe me, there is nothing I could find out that could ever, _ever_ make me regret anything that has happened between us."

She searched his face. She knew him well enough to know when he was lying, most of the time at any rate, and she could tell he believed every word he'd said.

And she desperately wanted to believe it too.

"Yeah?" she asked softly.

"Yes," he said.

He bent his head towards hers and gently brushed her lips with his. And when she responded by wrapping her arms around his neck and kissing him back, he slowly lowered her back onto the bed.

~oOo~

The Doctor walked around the console, monitoring the displays and making minute adjustments to the controls based on what he saw. Thankfully Mickey had wandered off somewhere in search of something to eat. Between the dangers of being towed into and through the Vortex – by an earlier version of his own TARDIS no less – and the necessity of not being noticed by his formal self, it was essential to keep on top of it, and he didn't need the distraction of trying to hold a conversation with the younger man.

A flashing yellow light drew his attention to the opposite side of the console, and he moved to examine it. Luckily it wasn't anything serious. He spun a nearby dial. As the TARDIS responded, the light went off.

As he began to circle the console again, he winced at the stab of pain that shot through his body. And it hadn't been the first one. He'd been having them ever since they'd entered the Vortex. At first they'd just been twinges so small as to be barely noticeable, but over the last hour they'd grown in frequency and intensity. He hadn't exaggerated the seriousness of the situation to Mickey. The pain was a harbinger of things to come that, if he didn't solve this mystery, could, would, ultimately lead to the wiping from existence this current regeneration.

There was the tiniest of chances that the spasms were being caused by the time he'd spent in the younger TARDIS's console room, from an echo backwards through time of the poison that had made the TARDIS and his former self sick, but it was far more likely that they were being caused by its forward filtering finally reaching him, just as it was causing his own TARDIS's illness.

There was one other possibility of course. Hundreds of years and five regenerations earlier he'd felt stabs of pain similar to the ones he was experiencing now. Then it had been caused by his previous selves being ripped out of time, changing his past and endangering his very existence.

But a Time Lord had done that. It would take a Time Lord to change his past like that, and there were no other Time Lords, not anymore.

No, the only way his past could change like that now is if he'd done it himself.

As another wave of pain shot through his body, behind him he heard Mickey return to the console room. In an effort to hide his condition from the other man, he gritted his teeth together and grabbed onto the edge of the console tightly enough that his knuckles turned white.

"Tha' kitchen o' yours 's grea'!" Mickey said through a mouthful of food.

"Galley," he corrected, trying to keep his voice steady. "It's a galley. The TARDIS is a ship, and the kitchen in a ship is called a galley." The Doctor took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Another one in and out, and the pain began to subside.

Mickey swallowed loudly. "Alright, then that _galley_ of yours is great. Had everything in it I wanted and then some. All I had to do is think of something, then open the fridge or the cabinet and it was there."

"That's good news," he said, glancing over his shoulder. Mickey had changed into a t-shirt and jeans and was holding a bag of crisps. "Very good. Means the TARDIS may not be as bad off as I thought." He patted the console. "She's trying to hang in there." Just like I am, he thought.

He turned around, leaned against the console, and crossed his arms in front of him, deliberately trying to look casual.

Mickey sat down on the jump seat and shoved a handful of crisps into his mouth.

"Be careful with those." The Doctor nodded at the crisps. "Don't want grease or crumbs on the console. Could gum up the works."

"I'll be careful. I'm not a little kid you know."

"Never said you were."

"Yes, you did. Used to say it all the time when you were Big Ears."

The Doctor winced, but this time at the memory of how many times he had insulted him rather than out of pain. "Ah, well, that was a long time ago. I was a different person back then."

"I'll say," Mickey responded, and the Doctor couldn't tell if it was a compliment or an insult.

Mickey put the crisp bag down beside him on the jump seat and rubbed his hands on his jeans. "So, how long is it gonna take before we get to the next place?"

"No idea," he answered. "The Vortex is a funny place. It's both all times and no time all at the same time. You can spend less than a second within it and arrive centuries later, or you can be in it days and arrive before you left. And of course since we're tied to his TARDIS, it'll depend on what he is doing. He wasn't a particularly good driver and his TARDIS needs work, so if he spends extra time in the Vortex, so do we."

"Yeah, but— what's that?"

Mickey was pointing over his shoulder, and the Doctor whirled around. The light on the far panel was blinking again, but this time in mauve.

"That, Mickey Smith, is trouble!"

A claxon began to sound, and he raced around the console and grabbed the bicycle pump. He began to pump it up and down as hard as he could.

"Mickey, grab that lever there!" he shouted over the noise. He gestured at a large lever that had suddenly appeared on the opposite side of the console before returning to the pump. "Shove it down and then spin the dial two panels over."

The alarm changed slightly in pitch, and the Doctor knew without looking that Mickey had immediately obeyed him.

"Alright, now, while I work on this, you press the colored buttons over there, red, green, blue, yellow. No, not yet! When I say start!"

Mickey immediately froze in his tracks.

With one hand he flipped a series of switches while with the other he continued with the pump. "Alright, when I say go, press red, green, blue, yellow, over and over and over, in the same rhythm as the flashing light until I say stop."

"So which is it?"

"Which is what?"

"Are you gonna say start or go?"

The Doctor groaned. "I don't know! Pick one!"

"Go, then."

"Alright, now when I say go, you start. Got it?"

"Yeah, got it."

"Alright, now… GO!"

Mickey lunged at the controls, but before he could finish the first sequence the claxon silenced. The TARDIS lurched. At the jolt, the Doctor and Mickey were thrown to the floor.

The Doctor looked up grimly. They had materialized without the TARDIS's typical metal-on-metal wheeze. Worse, the Time Rotor had frozen in mid-motion.

He jumped up and crossed to the monitor. When he turned it on – and thankfully it did turn on – all he could see were leafy green plants.

"Ow," Mickey complained as he stood up and joined him. "What was that?"

"An emergency signal, a big one, but whether it was from something happening inside the TARDIS or outside, I don't know."

"So where are we?"

"Don't know that either. Not until we go outside at least."

"So let's go outside."

Outside the TARDIS it was as green as it had appeared in the monitor. Large-leafed trees, covered in flowers that were in full bloom, surrounded them on all sides, creating green walls around and a canopy above. The air was filled with the buzz of bees, the chirps and caws of birds, and the screech of monkeys. Overhead, a brightly colored bird flew from the branch of one tree to another.

"Blimey it's hot," Mickey said, fanning himself with one hand.

"We're in the tropics," the Doctor replied. "On your own planet."

"How can you tell?"

He nodded up at the bird. "That parrot. Only place in the universe you can find them. So there's only one place we're likely to be."

"Krakatoa?"

The Doctor nodded.

"Krakatoa."


	28. Chapter Twenty-Seven

**Chapter Twenty-Seven – London, 29 July, 2007**

Rose’s nose twitched. A tickle. And another. Something was lightly tickling her face. And there was purring. She turned away, trying to go back to sleep, only to have a furry head butt her in the face. She wrinkled her nose and opened one eye. The still nameless cat purred louder and rubbed her forehead against her cheek. 

Rose yawned and stretched. Trying not to disturb John, she carefully propped herself up on one elbow and looked over him at the clock that sat on the small table on the opposite side of the bed. Half one. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d slept that late. On the other hand, they hadn’t gone to bed until well past 3, and hadn’t gone to sleep until much later than that. 

Her mouth twisted into a self-satisfied smile at the memory of exactly why they hadn’t gone to sleep immediately.

The cat’s purring grew still louder, now accompanied by her head butting Rose’s shoulder. 

“Alright, alright, I’m getting up,” Rose whispered. As she sat up she gently pushed the cat onto the floor.

Before she could get up herself, the bed shifted. Strong arms wrapped around her from behind, holding her in place.

“Just where do you think you’re going?” John asked. His voice was low, sensual, filled with dark promise. He had moved to sit behind her, and the warmth from his skin made her skin tingle. A familiar warmth began deep within her, accompanied by an answering twinge of longing between her legs.

He placed a kiss on her shoulder and another on her neck. She sighed, her eyelids fluttering shut, and leaned backwards against him. She turned her head and he kissed her—deep, lingering.

One large hand splayed across her belly, the other moved to cup her breast. She spun in his arms and straddled his lap, wrapping her arms around his neck and trapping his growing erection between them.

“Nowhere at all,” she told him and lowered her mouth to his.

A heavy thud on the bed broke them apart. John swore under his breath.

“Did anyone ever tell you you have rotten timing?” he asked the cat. Purring again, she crossed the bed, this time to head butt him. 

Rose climbed off his lap. “That’s where I was headed, to feed her.”

John sighed heavily. “I’ll do it. We have to get up anyway.”

As he got out of bed, the cat jumped down and ran out of room. Rose watched with interest as he began to follow. Although his erection had begun to fade, it still hung low along his thigh. And his arse… His arse was to die for. 

He paused by the door. “See something you like?” he asked without turning.

Rose flushed at being caught staring but decided to brazen it out. “Yep,” she told him. 

“Fantastic!” he said, chuckling. 

As he walked out of the room, Rose began to get out of bed herself. It was just as well. She needed the loo anyway. A quick swish of mouthwash wouldn’t be a bad idea either, she told herself.

She glanced around the room, searching for her clothes. Both of their t-shirts were in a lump next to the bed and her sweat pants were on the floor at the foot of the bed, but her knickers were nowhere in sight. 

She knelt down and looked under the bed. Nope, not there. She frowned thoughtfully and tried to remember exactly at what point he had removed them, a frown that quickly turned into a smirk of satisfaction at what he’d been doing when he’d pulled them off.

He definitely had to do that again.

She stood up and grabbed her t-shirt off the floor. It was still slightly damp in spots due to them being caught out in the rain. Perhaps he had one she could wear. But he certainly didn’t have any knickers she could borrow. She could go without if she had to, after all they were just going to go across the courtyard to her mum’s flat, but she’d really prefer to have them.

There was one last place to look, in the bed itself. She pulled back the blanket. Sure enough, they were buried deep under the covers on the opposite side of the bed. 

As she reached across the bed to grab them, something on the bedside table caught her eye. It was a notebook, the kind you drew in. Next to it lay a pencil and eraser. Somehow she hadn’t noticed them earlier. Possibly because she’d been slightly distracted.

All right, a little more than _slightly_ distracted.

But she wasn’t distracted now. She was curious. 

She grabbed her knickers and pulled them on. After a moment’s consideration, she pulled on her t-shirt as well, ignoring the clammy feel of the damp cotton against her skin, and circled the bed. 

There was only one reason to have a sketchpad, to draw in, and only one reason she could think of to keep it next to the bed.

So it would be handy if you woke up in the night.

Rose knew some people tried to capture dream images by sketching them immediately after they awoke, but what would John be dreaming about that he wanted to capture?

It would be a terrible invasion of privacy to look in it.

She glanced at the door.

She shouldn’t.

She heard the shower turn on. He’d be at least 5 minutes.

She really shouldn’t.

After another moment’s hesitation she picked it up and opened it, turning to a page at random. 

It was filled with an alien landscape, expertly rendered in red, orange, silver and gold. Two suns hung in the sky over a mountainous terrain. They framed the grass-filled prairie, at once familiar and completely alien, that dominated the foreground.

The focus of the drawing was the domed city that was on a hill on the far side of the prairie. Although it appeared to be in the background, everything about the drawing, from the framing of the mountains on either side to the alignment of the suns overhead, drew the eye to it. 

It was breathtaking, hauntingly and achingly beautiful. 

She’d had no idea he was such a talented artist. With colored pencils and paper he had somehow captured the planet’s life. She could almost feel the gentle breeze that blew through the swath of red grass on the plain and hear the rustle of the delicate silver leaves on the trees placed in the far left-hand corner of the page. 

Somehow Rose knew that this was the Doctor’s home planet. She had no idea how she knew, whether it was because of the deep emotions the drawing evoked or from a seeping out of knowledge from her time as Bad Wolf, but she was certain of it.

She sank down on the edge of the bed.

She turned the page to find another drawing of the same place—same mountains, same prairie, same city—but this one was as horrific as the previous had been beautiful. The landscape had been burned, the prairie and surrounding mountains scorched almost beyond recognition. The dome over the city--shining crystal before—was shattered and blackened. Enormous chunks of it were missing revealing a city that had been utterly destroyed. Most of the buildings had been leveled. The very few that remained were in ruins, burned and broken, a grotesque perversion of what it had been. As much as the first drawing had been full of life, this one was desolate, barren. 

Dead.

Tears sprang to her eyes. She knew that the Doctor’s planet had been destroyed, and what she had imagined was much the same as what she'd seen of the destruction of her own planet. She hadn’t really thought about the devastation that had to have happened prior to its annihilation. 

She turned the page again. And gasped.

Daleks. Daleks rolling down a crowded street, firing on the people as they ran away. Daleks soaring through the sky. Daleks in space.

Daleks… everywhere. Leaving a path of destruction in their wake.

“Flying killer pepper pots,” came John’s voice from the doorway. “Equipped with plungers and whisks. A psychiatrist could make a career off me.”

Rose turned towards him, embarrassed at being caught snooping. “Sorry,” she said. “Didn’t mean to invade your privacy like that.” She hurriedly closed the notebook.

“It’s alright,” he said. “You can look at it if you want. Mostly just silly dreams. Don’t mean anything.”

She nodded slowly, feeling a wave of guilt at knowing that the drawings were far more than just silly dreams but being unable to tell him. It was better he not know, not realize it was true, she told herself. Better that he thought the events of the Time War were just dreams than actually remembering them happening.

Still, she was amazed at how many of his memories were still there, intact, buried deep in his unconscious.

John entered the room and rummaged in the drawers for a clean t-shirt and pants. “Go ahead,” he urged as he began to pull them on. “You know you want to.”

Biting her lip, she nodded and continued. She opened it again, this time at the beginning.

Black and white sketches of faces, disembodied faces of men both young and old, filled one page. The next few were covered with odd creatures: mammalian, reptilian, aquatic, avian, or some combination with feathers, fur, scales and antennae. But not all were some form of people. Some were plantlike—far more plantlike than Jabe, the beautiful tree from the forest of Cheem—while others were crystalline. One seemed to simply be a giant eye, another oddly appeared to be made entirely of sweets. Also included were plastic caricatures of people—the animated shop dummies controlled by the Nestene Consciousness. On the following page was a rough sketch of the London Eye, with the facing page the large cavern underneath. She smiled as she saw an image of herself, swinging on a chain above the chasm.

And then a drawing of her in his arms.

The next pages was filled with sketches of what was clearly the TARDIS console. One was of the console as it was now, but the others were far, far different: some space age-y—very Spock—others sort of steam-punk Victorian. 

And in the upper right-hand corner was a tiny picture of the TARDIS. 

She quickly passed the next few pages—after all she had already seen them—and came across another drawing of the TARDIS, this time flying among the stars. The page was framed with what she knew were little sonic screwdrivers, some looking far different than the one she was used to.

The bed dipped as John sat down beside her. She noticed that while she’d been looking at the drawings, he’d pulled on a pair of jeans.

“What did I say?” he said. “Psychiatrist’s field day. A flying blue box in space? And this one is even weirder.” He turned the page himself. “Same blue box, this time surrounded by some sort of weird energy field. Don’t know what that’s supposed to be about.”

She turned the page again—and started. Filling the page was a picture of her face, but her younger self, as she had looked when they’d first met. 

“It’s me,” she whispered. 

“Yeah, it is,” he said.

She stared at the drawing. It was both her and not her. It made her look far prettier than she ever had in real life. “But… I don’t really look like that.”

“You’re right,” he said softly. “You’re much more beautiful.”

She looked up at him, eyes wide with surprise at the compliment, but he wouldn't meet her eyes.

Looking back down at the notebook, she turned the page again to find another picture of herself, this time as she was now—shorter hair, slightly different makeup—yet still far more beautiful than she’d ever been. She was speechless. Did he really see her like that?

“There’s really not much else,” he said, interrupting her thoughts. He took the sketchbook from her hands and set it back on the bedside table. “Metal men, more pepper pots, more flying blue boxes… Nothing that makes any sense, and absolutely no hints as to who I was before. Complete dead end.” He pulled her to her feet. “Now for some breakfast, lunch really, and then off to get your stuff.”

“My stuff?”

“Yeah,” he said. “You’re staying here until we can catch the person who’s been threatening you.”

Rose felt a flash of irritation at him. “You can’t just order me around, you know. You can’t just tell me what to do.” 

He scowled at her. “We had this argument last night,” he said in a tightly controlled voice. 

“Yeah, and I told you, you can’t just order me around,” she snapped.

He opened his mouth to argue, and with a rush she wondered why she was arguing with him. Was she seriously arguing about staying with him, when staying here with him was exactly what she wanted to do? 

“You could, however, just ask. You know, like a normal person,” she added.

His scowl slowly faded. For a moment he stared at her blankly. She crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow expectantly.

Slowly he grinned.

“Rose Tyler, would you care to stay here, with me, while we look for the loony bloke sending the notes?”

She grinned back. The tip of her tongue peeked out of the corner of her mouth. “I’d love to.”

His grin widened, and his blue eyes sparkled. “Fantastic!”

~oOo~

An hour later they were back at her mum’s flat. Rose took a shower and changed While John rummaged through the kitchen, making a meal for them out of leftovers from the fridge. 

After they ate, Rose packed her rucksack, grabbing what she thought she might need for a stay at John’s flat. She wasn’t entirely sure what or how much to bring since she had no idea how long she’d be staying there. 

She felt an overwhelming sense of déjà vu. It had been only three weeks earlier that she’d done the same thing with Mickey in her bedroom in the TARDIS. She hadn’t known then how long she’d be staying here either, but in hindsight she was glad she’d packed as much as she had. She’d been here clearly more than ten minutes and who knew how much longer it would be before the Doctor and Mickey got back. 

As she shoved a pair of jeans into the heavy canvas bag, she flashed back to the time she’d packed to move into the TARDIS. She’d stood exactly here, shoving clothes into this same rucksack. For a moment she wondered just exactly how long it had been since she’d started traveling with the Doctor. It was so easy to lose track of time while traveling in a time machine. It could have been a matter of months, or it could have been years as far as she knew. Either way, it felt like a lifetime ago. She’d been a completely different person back then.

Thinking about the TARDIS, she felt a wave of guilt. Between the weather and the wedding it had been days since she’d been able to visit her. And it didn’t help that John wanted them to spend all their free time together. As much as she loved it, it didn’t allow her much privacy. And she couldn’t risk him seeing the TARDIS. His sketches proved that somewhere deep down he still remembered her. She had no idea what would happen if he saw his ship in person, and she didn’t want to find out.

She vowed to herself to check on the TARDIS just as soon as she could. Hopefully she’d be able to slip away unnoticed during her lunch break tomorrow. 

As she shoved another t-shirt into her bag it struck her that this all was totally unnecessary. She really didn’t need to stay at John’s flat. The note writer hadn’t done anything dangerous— _so far, a little voice inside her whispered_ —and besides, she could take care of herself.

But she didn’t want to argue against staying with him, for purely personal, selfish reasons. And she wondered how much their changed relationship was behind his insistence that she move in with him, albeit temporarily. She'd like to think it had everything to do with it, but she doubted it. Underneath he was still the Doctor, she reminded herself, and the Doctor was completely clueless in some areas of his life.

As she finished packing, John wandered around her room, picking up random objects and examining them before setting them down again in completely different places. She smiled when he picked up her old teddy bear from her dresser.

“That’s Mr Tedopoulos,” she told him. She glanced around the room, looking to see if she forgot anything. “I’ve had him forever.”

“Is there a Mrs Tedopoulos?” he asked.

“There was,” she said. “She’s been gone ages. Don’t know whatever happened to her.”

As he put her teddy bear on her bedside table, she spotted her mobile phone on her dresser. Every day she tried to turn it on to see if she could contact the TARDIS, but it still wasn’t working. Still, there was a chance it would next time, or start working on its own, so she didn’t dare leave it behind.

As she picked it up and shoved it in her pocket, she noticed her TARDIS key was also on the dresser. She automatically moved a hand to her throat. She’d taken it off when she’d dressed for the wedding, and she’d forgotten to put it back on. 

“It’s a bit warm in here,” he complained as she slipped it over her head.

“Yeah, gets that way in the summer,” she said. “My mum had my dad nail the window shut when I was born. Didn’t want me falling out. And there’s something wrong with the heating vents. No air circulation in the summer, no heat in the winter.”

“Hmm.” John frowned. “Where’s the vent?”

“In the corner, over there.” She pointed out a spot near the floor next to the dresser. “Behind the pile of clothes.”

He knelt down and pushed the clothes away. “No surprise you can’t get any air out of there. You’ve got enough clothes here to prevent the assembled hordes of Genghis Khan getting through.”

She snapped her head around and looked at him, but he was busy removing the grating covering the vent. He did that fairly frequently, made some remark that he’d said to her before, or known something that he shouldn’t possibly have known about science or history or something. Most of the time he didn’t even seem to notice when he said something odd. 

But Rose always did. She knew it was the Doctor in him somehow seeping through the cracks.

While John was occupied with the vent, Rose halfheartedly straightened her room, mostly just for something to do rather than out of any sense of tidiness. There were clothes strewn all over the floor, not just in the corner, and she felt a twinge of embarrassment. John was so organized, particularly in comparison to her, and she vowed that she wouldn’t be such a mess while staying with him.

She picked up a stray t-shirt off the floor and spotted the cube that held the Doctor’s message to her. She glanced at John and debated whether or not to bring it with. She didn’t want to risk him finding it and managing to turn it on. On the other hand, she didn’t want her mother to do that it either, for completely different reasons that had more to do with privacy than maintaining timelines. She finally decided to take it with. She picked it up and shoved it deep into her rucksack.

“I thought so,” John said.

She turned. He was still working on the vent, a look of concentration on his face, his arm shoved in the vent practically up to his elbow.

He pulled something out and tossed it to her. 

“There you go,” he said.

Her jaw dropped when she saw what she held in her hands.

“Mrs Tedopoulus!” she exclaimed.

“She was really jammed in there,” he told her. “It’s no wonder you weren’t getting any air through.”

“I must have put her in there,” she said, shaking her head in disbelief. “Can’t imagine why, though.”

“Little kids do all sorts of goofy things. I once had to pull a three foot plastic snake out of a toilet. Kid’s older sister’s goldfish died and he saw her flush it. A couple of days later he decided his snake was dead too.”

“And he flushed it, too,” she guessed.

“Yep. His mum didn’t know, of course, had no idea it was down there until the toilet backed up.”

“And she called you to fix it?”

“Nope,” he said. “The downstairs neighbors did when their bathroom ceiling started leaking.”

She grimaced.

“So you shoving a teddy bear in a heating vent is nothing,” he told her.

Before she could answer, she heard the door to the flat open and close.

“Rose, are you here?” Jackie’s voice filtered in from the hall.

“We’re in my room,” Rose called back.

“What are you—never mind, I don’t want to know.” 

“Be right back,” Rose said to John, who had turned to replace the vent cover. He grunted noncommittally.

When Rose entered the hall, her mother rushed at her. She pulled her daughter into a tight hug.

“I was so worried about you, sweetheart,” Jackie said. “What were you thinking, running after that creep like that? You could have been killed!”

“Mum, I’m fine,” Rose said.

“I never thought I’d say this, but thank God himself was there. The thought of you out there in the streets in the middle of the night, all alone—he could’ve had a knife! He could’ve had a gun!” 

Rose didn’t answer. If her mum had any idea what she dealt with on a typical day traveling with the Doctor… 

She pulled away, and Jackie reluctantly let her go.

“Where’s Stuart?” Rose asked, mostly just to change the subject. 

“He had to go to work,” her mother answered. “He’ll be here tonight.”

“Good,” John said from the doorway. “Jackie, as soon as you’ve got yourself settled, we need to talk.”

~oOo~

A few minutes later they all sat down in the lounge. Although Jackie had made enough tea for all of them, she was the only one drinking it. Despite outwardly appearing calm, John could see that she gripped the mug tightly. It shook almost imperceptibly in her hands.

“How long have you been getting notes, Jackie?” John asked.

“Couple of weeks, maybe,” she answered. “Maybe a bit more.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Rose interjected.

“I didn’t want to worry you,” she told her. “After all, it’s not as if—” She broke off and looked away evasively. 

“‘It’s not as if’ what?” Rose asked.

After a quick glance at John, Jackie turned back to her. “It’s not as if it’s the first time I’ve found notes like that,” she admitted. “Got them on and off for years.”

“What!” Rose cried. “Did you go to the police?”

“Of course not,” Jackie answered.

“Why not?” Rose demanded. 

Jackie rolled her eyes. “It’s not exactly a big deal, Rose. This is the estate we’re on, not Notting Hill.”

“But still—”

“But nothing. This sort of thing happens every day. The police are interested in actual crimes, not nasty little notes like that.”

Rose harrumphed in frustration.

“What was in these nasty little notes?” John asked.

“The usual,” she told him. “Filth. Drawings and swearing mostly.”

Rage against the note writer welled up within him, but he tamped it down, refusing to let it be reflected in his face or his voice.

“Is there anything else you can remember about them?” he asked. “Anything special about the handwriting?” 

Jackie shook her head. “Nothing. Just bad handwriting and misspelled words. Half the time I couldn’t even read what it said.” 

“How about the paper?” he asked. “Was there anything special about it?”

Jackie’s brow furrowed as she thought. “Yeah,” she said after a moment. “They were usually on the back of some sort of advert—you know, the kind you see posted everywhere, for lost dogs or restaurants or something.” 

“Is that important?” Rose asked him.

“Could be,” he told her. “Could mean that he’s not planning this in advance. He could just be doing this when he’s drunk. Would explain the handwriting too. When he’s drunk he gets mad, grabs something handy, scribbles a note and shoves it in the door.”

“He?” Rose asked.

“Could be a she, but unlikely based on the kinds of threats you’ve been getting.”

“She’s been getting?” Jackie asked.

Rose glared at him. He’d spoken directly to her, and Jackie had picked up on that. They both knew that if she realized the notes were meant for Rose it was terrify her. Jackie was scared enough as it was.

He could have kicked himself.

“I’m reasonably certain those notes were meant for Rose,” he told her

Wide-eyed she stared at them, turning from John to Rose and back again. 

“Jackie, I want you to think,” he said. “Close your eyes and try to remember if any of them had your name on them.”

She closed her eyes and pursed her lips. John could practically see the wheels turn in her mind as she concentrated. Finally she opened her eyes and shook her head.

“I don’t remember any of them having my name on them, but they didn’t have Rose’s on them either. Why do you think they were for Rose?”

“Mum, John’s been getting them too,” Rose interjected. 

“We think that the person who’s been shoving little love notes in my cat flap has been also leaving them here. For Rose.”

Jackie stared at him. “Rose is right. I should have gone to the police.”

“Maybe, but it probably doesn’t matter either way,” he answered. Rose whirled on him but he continued before she could say anything. “Jackie was right, Rose. The police aren’t going to be interested in something like this.” He turned back to Jackie. “And if I’m right and the notes are for Rose, I don’t think you’re in any danger either. But there’s no point in taking chances. It might be best if you stayed with Stuart.”

“No,” she said firmly. “No piece of slime is going to force me from my home.”

“Mum…” Rose started.

“No, my mind’s made up,” Jackie told her. 

“Then do you want us to stay here with you?” Rose asked.

He shot her a look, and she glared back.

“No,” Jackie said firmly. To his complete and utter relief. “I don’t need to know what the two of you get up to, and I don’t want you doing it here. Besides Stuart already offered to stay here with me for a while.” 

“Well then, we’ll wait until he gets here,” Rose said. “Right, John?”

He grimaced, an expression he quickly changed to a manic smile as soon as she looked at him. 

“Yeah, we’ll stay,” he said cheerfully. “Love to.”

From the looks on their faces he could tell he wasn’t fooling either of them.

~oOo~

They ordered in pizza, and Jackie turned on a movie. It was all he could do not to jump up and rush out the door. It was just so… how had Rose put it? Domestic? That was it. Tea and a movie with her mother was too domestic. It chafed, grated on every last nerve in his body. 

But for Rose, to comfort her mother, he’d do domestic.

Well, for a couple of hours at any rate.

Finally, after a second movie had ended and a third movie started, Stuart arrived—to his overwhelming relief. 

As Jackie got up to let him in, Rose jumped up from her place on the sofa so quickly that it was obvious she’d been anxious to leave, too. 

“I’m going to go get my stuff,” she said. As she rushed out of the room, she nearly collided with Stuart. 

“Hi, Stuart!” she called over her shoulder as she disappeared into her bedroom.

“Hi, Rose,” Stuart replied, sounding confused over her actions. He gave Jackie a puzzled look. She shrugged.

“Stuart, there’s leftover pizza and beer in the kitchen.”

“No, thanks. I ate at the restaurant,” he said.

John didn’t miss the meaningful glance she gave her boyfriend, nor the jerk of her head towards the kitchen, but it took a glare and a second jerk of her head before Stuart caught on.

“Now that I think about it, I am a little hungry,” he said slowly.

Stuart had barely left the room when Jackie turned to him. Inwardly he winced. He steeled himself up for a confrontation, running through his mind every possible argument he could make in favor of Rose moving in with him.

Hold on. Moving in? She was just staying with him temporarily, just until they caught the person threatening her.

A little voice inside his head whispered that once she was there, he’d never want her to leave. 

Well, he’d just have to cross that bridge when they came to it, he told himself.

“Do—John, I want you to promise me you’ll do whatever it takes to keep Rose safe,” Jackie said.

He raised his eyebrows. Not what he had been expecting. At all. And he didn’t miss her stumbling over his name, but he chalked it up to her being upset.

“I will,” he said.

“No, I mean it,” she insisted. “It’s all very well and good for the two of you to pal around together, larking about and having a laugh. But I know you. You’re gonna go after the person writing the notes to Rose, and when you do, I want you to be careful. Don’t let Rose get caught in the crossfire. Make sure she doesn’t get hurt.”

“Jackie, I promise I’ll never let anything bad happen to Rose,” he said.

“You say that now—”

He met her eyes. “I promise you, Jackie. I’ll take care of her.”

She searched his face. Evidently what she saw satisfied her because she nodded.

Rose appeared in the doorway, the strap of her rucksack over her shoulder. “Ready to go?”

“Yep,” he said.

As she hugged her mum goodbye, Jackie looked at him meaningfully over Rose’s shoulder. He nodded.

“What were you and my mum talking about?” Rose asked as they walked out of the flat.

“Nothing. Why?”

She shrugged. “I dunno. It just seemed pretty… intense between the two of you when I came in.” As they started down the stairs, she shot him a quick glance. “She didn’t slap you, did she?”

He stared at her. “Why would she slap me?”

“Oh, no reason,” she said.

“Is that something she does? Goes around slapping people?” he asked incredulously.

“No! Of course not!” she said. But she wouldn’t meet his eyes, and he could tell she was lying. He wondered if he’d just dodged a bullet. Either way, he was now certain that if he didn’t keep her safe, a slap would definitely be in his future.


	29. Chapter Twenty-Eight

**Chapter Twenty-Eight – London, 29 and 30 July, 2007**

“Seriously? You think it’s either Chuck or Jimmy?” Rose asked.

She was sitting on a chair in John’s living room with him adjacent to her on the sofa, his arms folded across his chest, his face expressionless. It was so familiar, the pose, the expression on his face, even the green jumper he was wearing. The only thing missing was his suit of armor, the leather jacket that lay next to him on the back of the sofa.

“Yep,” he answered. 

“Why?” 

“Well, I haven’t had run-ins with many people lately, and those two are at the top of the list.”

She leaned back in her chair and crossed her arms across her chest, unintentionally mimicking his pose. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

He glanced away from her, a tell that he’d always had in this body that he didn’t want to admit something. His next self usually rubbed the back of his neck instead.

“Well?” she asked.

“I didn’t want to worry you. Didn’t want you involved.”

She let out a huff of exasperation, a growl just short of a scream. He could be so infuriating. One minute they were charging headlong into danger together, the next he was sending her away for her own good.

“Obviously I was already involved, since I was getting notes too.” Her tone was sarcastic and irritable, something she hadn’t really intended but didn’t regret in the slightest.

“I didn’t know that, did I?” he snapped. “And you didn’t know about the notes either.”

“You and my mother, both trying to protect me. You’re two peas in a pod.” This time she did intend to be insulting, and she got the reaction she expected.

He shook his finger at her. “Don’t you bring your mother into this.”

“If the shoe fits,” she said under her breath, but still loud enough to be heard. “So if you think you know who’s doing it, why haven’t you stopped him?” He mumbled something. “Sorry, what was that?”

“I couldn’t find them!”

“Seriously? You couldn’t find them?” She groaned. “This is why you should have talked to me.” She thrust her hand out at him, palm upward. “Phone.”

He rummaged in his pocket for it and handed it to her. “You really need to get a new one.”

She ignored him and tapped in a number. “Hi, Shareen. Have you seen Chuck or Jimmy around anywhere lately?” 

After Shareen told her she hadn’t, she immediately demanded to know why Rose wanted to know. Not wanting to get into the whole story—Shareen was as big a gossip as her mother and could talk just as long, and that was saying something—Rose quickly cut her off.

“Later,” she promised. “Do you have Rita’s number? It’s on my old phone and it died.” Shareen rattled off a number in her ear. “Okay, thanks. Sorry, I can’t talk right now, maybe tomorrow. Got to go.” 

She dialed again. “Hi, Rita, do you or Joe have any idea where Chuck could be?” She rolled her eyes at Rita’s answer. “Thanks. Talk to you later,” she said and disconnected.

“What did she say?” John asked.

“Just a second. I need to make one more call.” Another tap into the phone. “Hi, Mrs. Stone? It’s Rose. I’m looking for Jimmy. Is he around?” She listened for a moment and then smiled. “Thanks. Nice talking to you too.” She rang off and handed him back his phone. “She’s always liked me. Better than she likes Jimmy sometimes.”

“So, what did they say?” he asked.

“Mrs. Stone doesn’t know where Jimmy is for sure. She says he usually pops in and out every few days or so to raid the fridge or have her do his wash, but he hasn’t been back in more than a week. And Rita doesn’t ‘give a shit where the bloody wanker is’, that’s a quote by the way, but she thinks Chuck is staying at their flat.”

“I checked his flat. There was no sign of him, and no one had seen him around.”

She frowned. “When you checked his flat, did you actually go in or just knock on the door?”

“Knocked on the door.” 

She stared at him incredulously. 

“What? I didn’t have a key!”

She rolled her eyes. “Amateur.” She stood up and held out her hand to him. “Come on.”

~oOo~

Rita had told Rose that she had given a spare key to the elderly sisters who lived next door, Irene and Gladys, so they stopped there to pick it up on their way. It wasn’t entirely necessary, Rose informed him, she’d been able to jimmy the locks on the doors since she was fifteen and had locked herself out of her own flat. But it was quicker to use a key, not to mention much more polite. She didn’t care what Chuck thought, but Rita was one of her best friends and she didn’t want to break into her flat unless she had to. 

Despite the hour Gladys was delighted to see them and immediately invited them in for tea. Irene, however, perhaps sensing the oddness of John and Rose asking for the key at 9 o’clock at night, didn’t press. Instead she shushed her sister as she handed the key over, at the same time eliciting a promise from John and Rose that they would come over for a visit soon.

Once at Rita and Chuck’s flat, Rose knocked on the door on off chance Chuck was there. While they waited for a response, one neither of them truly expected would come, John’s palm itched, tingled. It felt as if there was something missing from his hand, like he should have been holding something, like there should have been something there that wasn’t. It was an odd feeling, one that made no sense and that he’d be hard pressed to describe, not quite déjà vu but not _not_ déjà vu either. He’d gone so far as to move to reach into the pocket of his leather jacket for whatever it was only to realize that not only wouldn’t whatever it was be there, but he wasn’t even wearing his jacket. 

Gritting his teeth, he stretched his hand wide open and then squeezed it shut—open, closed, open, closed—in a futile effort to relieve the sensation.

After several moments, Rose unlocked the door and the tingling feeling vanished, disappearing so completely it was as if it hadn’t been there at all. Odd. He stared at the palm of his hand as if looking at it long enough would force it to explain itself to him.

“You all right?” 

He looked up. Rose had already entered the flat and had turned back when she’d realized he hadn’t followed her. She was now staring at him, curiosity and concern written on her face.

“What, me? Never better.” He gave her a big grin, and in return she shot him a look that said she didn’t believe him in the slightest but wasn’t worried enough to ask him about it. It may also have hinted that she believed he was in need of psychiatric help, something he certainly didn’t dispute, but that last part may have just been him projecting his own thoughts onto her. 

“Then are you coming in?” she asked. “Or are you just going to stand around out here all night?”

“Coming in,” he said brightly. 

John had never been in Rita's flat before, but as he scanned the room he was certain it had never been like this while she’d lived here. To describe it as squalid was an understatement, and an insult to squalid things. It was more than just the filthy clothes laying all over the small room, obviously cast aside and left wherever they landed. One of the lamps had been knocked off a table in the corner and now lay on its side on the floor, and there was rubbish everywhere--dirty dishes; takeaway containers, many still half full and in some cases moldy; beer cans and liquor bottles on every horizontal surface; and ash trays, not just containing cigarette butts, with their contents spilling out all over the tables. 

His nostrils flared. The whole place reeked of smoke, alcohol, putrefaction, and unwashed humans.

Rose wrinkled her nose. "It's a good thing that Rita's not coming back. She'd kill him."

John didn't bother to answer. Instead he wandered the room, examining things and setting them aside. There was no reason to bother with stealth; no one would notice the results of anyone searching the place. In fact, given the condition of the place he was certain nothing short of a backhoe coming in and clearing the place out would be given a second thought.

He spotted a small bookcase next to the television. It obviously belonged to Rita; its primary contents were Mills and Boone novels, although there were a few others in the mix: a couple of mysteries, a sci fi, a dog-eared copy of the first Harry Potter novel.

He frowned. Most of the books had been pushed onto the floor, and a few had been torn to pieces in someone’s fit of anger. He scanned the area and saw a few others on the other side of the room, including one lying on the floor next to the lamp. That must have been what knocked it over, he thought, someone throwing the book at it. 

Wandering again, he noticed a pile of the post on the table next to the sofa. He picked it up and flipped through it. Bills, advertising, a fashion magazine, but nothing that would indicate where Chuck was.

As Rose headed out of the room, into the kitchen if the layout of this flat was anything like his own, he put the post down, intending to search the rest of the flat. He stuck his head in the bedroom. More cast aside clothes. An unmade bed. By the look and the smell of it, its sheets likely hadn't been changed since Rita left. 

But the living room and bedroom were pristine when compared to the bathroom. There was grime and dirt and hair, even cast off toilet paper, on the floor, on the walls, on the mirror, and in the tub. And yes, there was a filthy, unflushed toilet. Even he was disgusted, and he cleaned up this sort of thing frequently when he had to make repairs on the estate.

He quickly closed the door on the mess, in part so Rose wouldn't have to see it and in part so neither of them would have to smell it.

Rose emerged from the kitchen. "He's a pig," she stated flatly. "But he's still living here."

He'd gotten the same impression but was curious how she'd come to that conclusion. "How can you tell?"

"Fresh milk in the fridge. If he'd been gone too long, it would have gone off."

He grinned. "Very good."

"So what do we do now?"

"Wait for him."

“Here?”

“Yep.”

“Seriously?”

“Yep.”

“There’s no saying he’s going to come back tonight,” she warned.

“No, there isn’t.”

She looked around herself in distaste, a pained expression on her face, and then sighed.

“You don’t have to stay,” he said.

“If you’re staying, I’m staying. And it's not like I haven't been in worse places with you."

He stared at her. "When did I ever take you to a dump like this?" he demanded indignantly.

"When we—" She broke off suddenly and bit her lip, eyes wide. "Sorry. That wasn't you. Never mind." She quickly looked away and returned to surveying the room, giving the clear impression she was avoiding looking at him. "Help me look for a bin."

"Why?"

"There's no way I'm waiting in here the way it is."

Fifteen minutes later Rose was satisfied enough with the condition of the room that she was willing to stay. Dirty clothes had been dumped in the bedroom, dishes had been put in the kitchen, and the rest of the mess thrown in the bin, which John had promptly taken out to the large one in the alley. When he got back, she was wiping down the coffee table with a clean cloth she said she'd found in a drawer in the kitchen.

“There. It’s not clean, but it’s better. Better enough that we can stay for a few hours without being poisoned from toxic waste.”

She turned and began to walk in the direction of the bathroom.

John cleared his throat. She stopped in her tracks and turned back to him.

“Where are you going?”

“Wash my hands,” she said.

"Better use the sink in the kitchen," he told her. "Believe me, you don't want to go in there."

"Worse than out here?"

He nodded, a wry grin on his face.

"Eww." She pulled a face. As she reentered the kitchen, John sat down on the sofa and turned on the telly.

~oOo~

At three o'clock John finally heard the telltale sound of someone trying, and failing, to insert a key into the lock on the door. 

He snapped off the television. He and Rose had been watching movies, with her first neatly tucked under his arm and then with her head in his lap. Within minutes she was sound asleep, and she hadn’t moved since.

Now he gently jostled her arm, shushing her when she opened her eyes. She sat up abruptly. He placed a finger on his lips and then pointed at the door. She nodded. 

The metal-on-metal scraping continued, finally to be replaced by the key slipping into the lock. With a loud click the door unlocked and the knob turned.

Chuck staggered through the open door and into the room. With a lurch, he stumbled to the sofa, nearly falling in the process, and almost sat on Rose. She shrieked and he fell to the floor, landing on his arse.

"Bloody hell!" he exclaimed.

John clicked on the light, and Chuck blinked at the glare. He stared at them in confusion. "Who're you?"

John rolled his eyes. 

"Seriously? Just how much have you had?" Rose asked, her voice laden with disgust.

"What's it to you? Yer not my mum. Who the hell are you anyway?" He blearily peered at them, looking from one to the other and back again. After a moment his eyes widened in recognition. "Fuck. That's all I need. What the hell are you two doin' in my flat at midnight?" He pushed himself to his feet and slightly swayed, unable to completely stand upright. "Where's Rita?" He made his way to the bedroom and stuck his head through the doorway. "Rita? Oi! Rita! Where are you?"

"She's not here," John told him.

"And it's not midnight either," Rose added.

Chuck whirled on them. The movement caused him to tip over and he only caught himself from falling by leaning heavily against the wall.

"Where is she?"

John folded his arms across his chest and looked at him expressionlessly. "Not. Here."

"And she's not coming back either," Rose told him.

"But she's got to!" Chuck whinged. 

"No, she doesn't," John said.

Chuck slid down the wall until his bum hit the floor. "But you know where she is, yeah? You can tell her to come back."

"No."

Chuck turned to Rose. "But you'll tell her? Tell her I'm sorry and she needs to come home." 

"There's no way I'm telling her that," Rose said flatly. 

"Why?"

She stared at him in disbelief. Her lip curled in disgust. "Because you're a sorry sack of shit that doesn't deserve her, that's why."

Chuck’s face crumpled, and his eyes welled up with tears. “I know. And that’s why she needs to come back, because I don’t deserve her.”

“That doesn’t even make sense,” she told him.

“See? I can’t even make sense without her.”

“What—” 

“You been writing notes to us?” John interrupted.

Chuck turned back to him. He stared at him wide-eyed and jaw slack, visibly frightened.

“You have been, haven’t you?”

“A… a couple, yeah.”

“More than just a couple,” John corrected. “Why?”

“I just wanted you to tell me where she was,” Chuck said. “I know you two know where she is.”

“Why didn’t you just ask me?”

“I… I couldn’t.”

“Why not?”

Chuck didn’t answer. He looked away, shamefaced.

“Because he’s _chicken_ ,” Rose interjected. “He’s scared of you. Isn’t that right, Chuck?”

“Is that why you’ve been leaving filthy notes to Rose?” John asked. “You scared of her too?”

“Filthy notes?” The younger man turned back to him. “No, I’m not… I didn’t…”

“Didn’t what?” 

“Those disgusting notes of yours scared my mum half to death, you bloody wanker!” Rose exploded.

Chuck looked up at her. “But I…”

“What?” she snapped.

He looked away again. “Never mind.”

“You stay away from my mum, and you stop leaving notes, or I’m gonna report you for harassment! You got it?” 

Chuck mumbled something under his breath. 

“Sorry, I didn’t catch that,” John said.

“Yeah, I got it.”

“In the morning you better remember this,” John warned. “Because if you’re scared of me now, just wait until you see me angry. And I’m going to get very, very angry if you don’t stop leaving those notes. And you stay away from Rita too. You stop looking for her or some people who aren’t as forgiving as I am are going to stop you.”

“Who?”

“Her family. And they’re very cross with you. If you come near her, they’re gonna make me look like Mother Teresa. Do you understand that?”

Chuck nodded sullenly.

“Now say you’re sorry to Rose for leaving those notes and scaring her mother.”

“Sorr—”

John nudged him with his foot. “Say it like you mean it.”

“Sorry,” Chuck muttered.

John grinned, a smile that most people would think was happy but that those who knew him well would know was anything but. “Now that wasn’t that hard, was it?” 

~oOo~

After getting an assurance from Chuck that he’d stop harassing people, they left him to sleep it off.

“Well, that was a bit anticlimactic,” Rose said once they were out of the flat. 

“Sorted in six hours, thirty-seven minutes,” John said. “Guess I should have told you about it earlier.”

“Guess you should have,” she said with a laugh. She crossed to the railing and leaned against it. The buildings that surrounded the courtyard were dark. Even the lights in her mother’s flat were off. “I’ll tell Mum in the morning that it’s all sorted, and she doesn’t have to worry about the notes anymore.”

“Yeah.” 

John moved next to her and leaned against the support post. Out of the corner of her eye she could see him watching her.

She stared at the pavement below. The lights from the stairwells, along with the streetlights, cast oddly shaped shadows on the ground and along the walls of the buildings. “Uh, I s’pose that this means I don’t need to stay with you after all,” she said hesitantly. 

“S’pose not,” he said. He was silent for a second. “Unless…”

She jerked her head around to look at him. “Unless what?”

He shrugged. “I dunno. I mean… you could still stay with me. If you want.”

She met his eyes. “Do you want me to?”

He didn’t answer immediately, and for the span of several heartbeats the only sounds she could hear were the distant sounds of the city and the almost deafening pounding of her heart.

“Yeah. Yeah, I do,” he said quietly.

She smiled. “I do too.”

He began to grin, a small smile that grew and grew until it lit up his entire face.

“Fantastic.”


	30. Chapter Twenty-Nine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it took so long to post this chapter. I had problems with my outline. I knew what had to happen, but the order I had it happening wasn't working. I spent well over a month working on scenes that I ultimately realized needed to be later in the story. Once I figured that out, this chapter went fairly quickly. The good news is that based on how much work I put into the other scenes, the next couple of chapters are already half done and I hope to be able to post them soon.
> 
> As always, thanks so much for sticking with this story, and thanks so much for all the comments. Although I've been terrible about answering them, I really appreciate them.

**Chapter Twenty-Nine—Indonesia, 25 August, 1883**

Mickey wandered the tiny clearing in the Indonesian rainforest where the TARDIS had landed.

"Incredible," he said. "Absolutely incredible." He gently touched the delicate petal of a bright pink flower before examining the leaf of a rubber tree plant. He looked up. The tree towered over his head. "Wow. I didn't know these could grow so big! My gran had one of these in a pot in her flat when I was little. I thought it was huge, but it never got more than two feet tall."

He moved on. He paused to bend over a cluster of tiny white flowers whose petals were so small and thin they resembled the fine hairs on a woolly caterpillar. He took a big sniff, and promptly sneezed.

While Mickey was distracted, the Doctor closed his eyes. During the crisis of trying to land the TARDIS, he'd been able to throw off the pain he'd been experiencing, but with that distraction now gone, it was beginning to return. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, and the pain receded to a dull ache centered behind his left eye.

The buzzing of a fly trying to land on him jerked him back to the present, the sound serving to remind him that he was no longer wearing his telepathic dampers. His eyes flew open. He pulled the dampers out of his pocket but before he put them in his ears, he cast his senses outward.

Nothing.

His younger self wasn't here.

Knowing he didn't need the dampers yet but not wanting to bother with them later, the Doctor shoved them in his ears and took out his sonic screwdriver.

He pointed his screwdriver at the trees, and with a flip of his thumb against the controls, he began to scan the surrounding area. The screwdriver's whir had the added benefit of chasing off the fly.

Holding the screwdriver directly in front of him, the Doctor slowly spun in a circle, panning the area around them like a cameraman filming a panoramic shot for a big-budget movie. It was only after he'd rotated 360˚ that he stopped and examined the screwdriver's tiny display. The readings verified what he already knew.

"No evidence of his TARDIS within fifteen miles of here." He scanned the area again, sky and forest, before pointing it directly at the ground. He glanced at the readings. "And what's worse, no evidence of anything that could have poisoned it."

As he pocketed his screwdriver, he felt a mild disturbance in the air on his face and hands. At the same time, the leaves of the trees surrounding them quivered almost imperceptibly. With a rustle of wings, a pair of parrots flew out of a nearby tree. After circling twice above their heads, the birds returned to their perches, squawking loudly.

Mickey waved his hand around his head in an attempt to shoo the fly away, which had now taken to dive bombing him. "So what do we do now? Go to the village and look for him again?"

"Assuming there is a village."

"There has to be one. There's that picture of him here."

The Doctor barely heard him. The ache behind his eye flared, had become a shooting pain, the forerunner of what promised to be a massive headache. He winced, noisily sucking air through gritted teeth, and rubbed his temple.

"What's wrong?" Mickey asked.

The Doctor shook his head. It was a mistake; the motion caused his whole head to throb. "Nothing. Just a bit of a headache."

He moved from rubbing his temple to rubbing his eye. The pain was preventing him from thinking clearly. He knew he was missing something…

"Wait. What?" he asked Mickey.

"What what?"

"What did you say just now?"

"I asked what was wrong."

The Doctor shook his head. And hissed. Surely there was a knife stabbing him in the head, he thought. He went back to rubbing his temple. "No, before that."

"I was saying there had to be a village because there was a picture of him here."

"Before that!" he snapped.

"I asked if we should go look for him in the village."

The Doctor nodded.

"So we should go look for him in the village," Mickey said.

The Doctor shook his head.

"So which is it?" Mickey asked. "Do we look for him or not?"

"It's too soon," the Doctor told him. "I scanned for his TARDIS, remember? He's not here yet."

"How can he not be here? He's got to be here. We were following him, and we're here."

The Doctor took a deep breath and let it out slowly, concentrating on forcing the pain out of his body. It receded back into a dull ache before disappearing entirely. "Sling shot effect. Our TARDIS was linked to his. He slows down for some reason, we don't, and the link swings us past him. We arrive before he does. Either that or…"

"Or?"

"Or we're out of range. He's farther away than 15 miles."

Mickey pulled a face. "That's a long walk."

"Worse than that. If he's more than 15 miles away, he's probably on a different island than we are."

A low rumble filled the air, and the Doctor felt the ground vibrate ever-so-slightly beneath his trainers. The parrots flew off again. This time they landed in a different tree, on a branch near the top of the canopy. In the distance, a monkey shrieked.

"What was that?" Mickey asked. "Thunder?"

The Doctor shook his head. "Earthquake. A harbinger of things to come." He inhaled deeply. There was a slight odor of sulfur mixed in with the pungent scents of flowers and dampened earth. "Based on the magma buildup underneath our feet, it's a day, maybe two, before the main explosion." He glanced up at the sky. Through the trees he could see the sun high overhead. Midday or possibly early afternoon. "I need to figure out where we are." He licked his index finger and held it up high over his head.

"I thought we were on Krakatoa."

"You'd better hope we aren't. Because it's almost Volcano Day, and when it blows it'll take most of the island with it." He put his finger back in his mouth, tasting for salt, sulfur, pollen, and a variety of other substances. After a moment's analysis, he nodded decisively.

"This way," he said, and headed into the trees.

~oOo~

Deep in the forest of a nearby island, the air was filled with the songs of easily a dozen species of brightly colored birds. Rather than the cacophony that one would normally expect from so many diverse calls, their melodies wove in and out, point and counterpoint, creating a natural symphony of sound, only punctuated by the occasional scream of macaques and langurs.

A loud groan, accompanied by a rush of wind that shook the trees, startled the birds into silence and caused the monkeys to screech in protest. The groaning continued, now joined by an unearthly shrieking, growing louder and louder and louder until it drowned out the sounds of the monkeys. The air shimmered. Through the distortion a light flashed. A column of blue appeared and faded, again and again, and with each appearance it grew brighter and brighter and brighter.

Silence fell. A tall blue box stood where a second earlier there had been nothing.

A door in the side of the box opened and a tall man emerged. Despite the stifling temperature of the tropical rainforest, he wore a heavy leather jacket over a dark blue jumper.

The man closed the door and walked off into the woods.

Used to the sounds of frequent earthquakes, as well as the odd behavior of the residents of the nearby village, a moment later the birds began their symphony again.

And in the distance, on Krakatoa, thick grey smoke arose from the volcano.

~oOo~

Mickey was going to die here. He knew it; he was totally convinced that he'd never leave this island, that after an excruciating death this was where he'd spend eternity. But not because of the volcano. Because of the Doctor.

The Doctor had decided that they needed to be on higher ground for him to figure out exactly where they were in relation to the volcano. He set a rapid pace as he led him through the forest and up a mountain, only pausing to periodically scan the area with his screwdriver.

But the Doctor seemed to see trails where there were none. On their way up the mountain, they'd climbed over boulders, crawled under low lying branches of bushes and trees, and tromped through rivulets created by a brief downpour that had soaked them to the skin and had done nothing to alleviate the heat and humidity of mid-summer in the tropics.

The Doctor was clearly trying to kill him.

And to think he'd thought all the running was tough. He was hot, muddy, hungry, and drowning in sweat. And exhausted. Completely, utterly exhausted.

He was _so_ out of shape.

Mickey vowed that if he lived through this, the first thing he'd do when they got back to the estate was get a gym membership.

Finally after about three hours of hiking and climbing and crawling, not to mention listening to the Doctor's nonstop monologue on the flora, fauna, and history of the area, he'd had enough.

"Doctor, stop!" he pleaded.

The Doctor turned back to face him. "What is it?" he asked sharply. "Did you see something?"

Mickey peeled off his T-shirt and sank down on a fallen log next to the Doctor's so-called trail. "No. I just need a break."

The Doctor hesitated. He glanced over his shoulder, the way they had been headed, and then nodded. "All right. But only a brief one."

The Doctor sat down next to him and reached into one of the pockets of his jacket. He pulled out a silver flask and handed it to him.

"Here."

Mickey turned it over in his hands. The flask was covered in a complex pattern of interlocking circles and other geometric shapes. He raised an eyebrow. "Thought alcohol was bad for you when exercising."

The Doctor rolled his eyes. "It's just water. You need to stay hydrated."

Mickey unscrewed the top and took a sip. The water was delicious, cool, crisp, and clear with just a hint of minerals for taste. He tilted his head back and poured it in his mouth.

"Careful," the Doctor warned as he pulled off his tie. "There's more in there than it looks like. You don't want to make yourself sick."

After a last swallow, Mickey reluctantly passed it back to the Doctor, who wiped the mouth of the flask with a clean corner of his tie before taking a sip himself. Then he pulled a handkerchief from his pocket, poured enough water over it until it was dripping, and passed it to Mickey.

As Mickey wiped down his face and neck with the handkerchief, the Doctor pocketed both the flask and his tie. It was only then that Mickey realized that despite the heat, the Doctor was still wearing his suit jacket.

"Aren't you hot?"

The Doctor shook his head. "Time Lord."

"You always say that. What does that even mean?"

"Even though outwardly we look the same, my biology is very different from yours. Beyond living longer, Time Lords are—well, were—physiologically superior. My muscles are stronger, my bones are sturdier, my immune system is more efficient, I require less sleep… Under the right circumstances, my body can even rid itself of toxins that would otherwise kill me."

"So when you say you're a Time Lord, you're saying you're better than us."

The Doctor looked at him sharply. "No. Not better. Different. In fact, in some ways..." His voice trailed off, and he stared off into the distance, not finishing the thought. Before Mickey could ask him what he meant, the ground rumbled again.

"We've got to get going," the Doctor said. "We've still got a long way to go and it's getting late. It'll be night soon."

Mickey frowned. Now that the Doctor had mentioned it, he noticed that the shadows on the rainforest floor were growing darker. And the thickness of the canopy in this part of the forest meant they wouldn't even be aided by moonlight.

With a heavy sigh, he bowed to the inevitable. He stood up. "Well, then, what are we waiting for? Let's go."


	31. Chapter Thirty

**Chapter Thirty—London, 25 August, 2007**

As the sounds of power tools and rap music filtered through to the office from the garage, Rose glanced up from her position at the service desk to look at the large clock that hung over the garage’s office door. Half one. It was impossible, she thought. Surely it had been at least a half an hour since the last time she’d checked. But if the clock was to be believed, it had only been five minutes. 

The clock’s second hand tick tick ticked, creeping around its face so slowly Rose found it almost physically painful to watch. It had to be wrong, she told herself. Perhaps the battery was dying.

The day had dragged; despite it being Saturday, there had been very few appointments for cars to get fixed. The lack of customers meant there was very little to do other than getting caught up on the past week’s work. Half of the mechanics had even been sent home, and two of the ones that remained had been assigned other jobs; one was cleaning the garage floor and the other reorganizing the stock room. 

Slow days were rare at the garage, particularly slow Saturdays; usually they were so busy she barely had time to think. But today the lack of business was a good thing. Abhirati Mudali’s baby was due to arrive any day, and she was using the extra time to train her niece, Daphne, who had been hired to do the books and manage the office while Abhirati was gone.

Giving Rose even less to do that day, other than answer the phone and do a bit of filing. Meanwhile Daphne appeared overwhelmed with the idea that she’d essentially be running a great portion of the business. Rose wasn’t surprised. Daphne seemed a little young for all that responsibility. 

Then Rose laughed at herself. Daphne had been a year ahead of her in school and was older than she was. At least Rose thought she was. It fleetingly crossed her mind again, as it did on a regular basis, that since she didn’t know exactly how much time she’d spent traveling with the Doctor, she really didn’t know how old she was in linear years. But her time on the TARDIS, regardless how long it had been, made her feel far older, and far wiser, than her years. However many of them there had been. 

While Abhirati was distracted with showing Daphne how to manage the garage’s inventory on the computer, Rose pulled her brand new, bright red mobile out of the pocket of her jeans. She hadn’t wanted to buy it but her mother, and John truth be told, had nagged her into it. Her mother was tired of having to call John’s phone every time she wanted to talk to Rose, and John was tired of getting the calls. 

She’d hated the idea of buying a new one. It felt like giving up: giving up on her old phone ever working again, and giving up on the Doctor returning. Rose had finally given in, but only because even she had to admit that she really did need a phone of her own that actually worked. But she’d kept the old one; she buried it deep in her rucksack along with the Doctor’s message cube. She checked it every morning while John was in the shower in the hopes that it had turned itself back on and she had a message from the Doctor saying they’d solved the mystery and were on their way back.

But so far… nothing.

It had been seven weeks since the Doctor had left her here to watch over his younger self while he and Mickey tried to figure out what was going on, and not only were they not back yet, with her phone not working there had been no word from them either. And the longer they were gone, the more worried she got. 

For the first time she really understood what it had been like for her mother when she’d been missing for a year: no word, no way of knowing where she was, whether she was alive or dead. 

Just like she had no way of knowing whether they were alive or dead…

No, she couldn’t let herself think that way. They were okay, wherever they were. They were just late getting back because the Doctor was a terrible driver. It was more than just being off a year after that first trip. They’d been off _a hundred years_ when he’d tried to take her to the Ian Dury concert. And he’d managed to get them back here eventually. 

He was just late again, she told herself. He’d manage to get himself and Mickey back.

He was just late.

After another glance at the clock, Rose peeked at the phone’s small display screen. The time on the phone matched what the clock said. For a moment she considered the possibility they were both wrong, that perhaps they’d been caught in a time vortex or something that made time pass much more slowly in the office than in the rest of the universe and that somehow she was the only one aware of it. After all, it wouldn’t be the first time that had happened to her.

Been there, done that. 

Bought that T-shirt.

But this was the estate, not the Space Station Neva or wherever the heck it had been. 

But weird things had happened on the estate before, she reminded herself. Homicidal shop window dummies. Slitheen. Alien hedgehogs and murderous Father Christmases and killer Christmas trees.

She really missed all that. 

Abhirati and Daphne left, leaving her a six inch pile of invoices to file while they went check on something in the storeroom. Rose stared down at the papers in front of her. Instead of fighting alien invasions, she was filing. 

She sighed.

~oOo~

The Honda’s engine sputtered as John pulled it into the garage. The ancient Accord almost certainly had a dirty carburetor. Its owner, an older woman who’d purchased it new in 1977, had been complaining about it having trouble starting, running rough, and stalling. They were all classic symptoms of a bad air/fuel mix, something John could smell immediately when he started it. It was so bad he could taste the incompletely burned hydrocarbons in the air. But if he was right, it was a simple fix.

He turned off the engine and pulled the lever on the floor next to the driver’s seat, unlatching the bonnet. When it popped open, he climbed out of the car.

The day had been a total bust. So far he’d changed six spark plugs, reattached two hoses, and replaced the light bulb on a headlamp. The Honda represented the biggest challenge of the day, and he could have fixed it in his sleep. 

He lifted the bonnet, propped it open and stuck his head underneath. Out of the corner of his eye he spotted Rose through the doorway, standing at the service desk counter. Still bent over the engine, he stopped what he was doing and watched her. She was fiddling with one of her earrings and staring off into space, clearly as bored as he was. 

After a moment, her hand moved downward, from her ear to the key she always wore on a chain around her neck. Absently she rubbed it between her fingertips. He sighed in resignation, recognizing the sign. Invariably whenever she began to play with the key, like she was doing now, she’d sneak off for a while, usually during the brief lunch period they had at the garage but at other times as well. Normally she’d only be gone for a half an hour or so, but a few times she’d been gone for several hours. 

She’d been doing it ever since they’d met. Week after week after week.

No, that wasn’t fair. She wasn’t sneaking off. She usually told him in advance that she wouldn’t be able to have lunch with him, or at the very least left a message for him with Abhirati. But she had never told him where she was going, what she was doing while she was gone. And he hadn’t asked. Over and over and over, he’d told himself to allow her her space, not to invade her privacy.

Over the weeks, he'd tried to convince himself that he was just worried about her, just concerned for her safety. After the business with Chuck it only made sense. Despite Chuck's assurances that he would stop leaving notes for Rose, John didn't believe him. People who left notes as nasty as the ones Jackie had found didn't just stop. Instead, the situations usually escalated. In fact, with that in mind, on more than one occasion he had gone out of his way to let Chuck know that he was watching him to make sure he was leaving Rose alone.

But if John was truly honest with himself, far beyond his concern for her it was curiosity, and no small amount of jealousy, that was eating at him. Not knowing where she was going was driving him spare. And every time she left, the feelings grew. 

Where was she going? What was she doing? 

Was she meeting someone?

Deep down, he didn’t really believe she was cheating on him. But despite them living together they’d made no promises to each other. 

And she’d disappeared before. Before he’d met her she’d run off with her mysterious Doctor. She’d left—and been gone for a year—without telling anyone, not even her mother, that she was going. He was worried that she’d do it again, that one day she’d be gone without warning, without a goodbye.

That was his biggest fear, that the Doctor would come back and she’d run off again. 

No, his biggest fear was that the Doctor was already back and she just hadn’t told him.

“Manchester!”

The sound of his boss’s voice, loud enough to be heard over the radio and coming from directly behind him, startled him so much that he jumped. He banged his head into the underside of the bonnet and swore.

“Are you deaf?” Mudali asked. “I must have called you five times.” When he turned his head to see what John had been looking at, John automatically did as well. Rose was still clearly visible through the open door. Mudali made a noise of derision. “Get your mind back on your job. I’m not paying for you to moon over your girlfriend.”

John huffed in irritation. “What do you want, Mudali?”

“Turn the Honda over to Todd. There’s a Mercedes in the car park with your name on it. Owner had it towed here specifically so you would fix it. Doesn’t want anyone else.” He leaned towards John and dropped his voice so low that he could barely be heard over the sounds of the garage. “The owner, he’s big money—handmade suit, Italian shoes, diamond ring. We do this right… Well, I don’t need to tell you what it could mean for the business.” He shook his finger at him. “John, don’t fuck this up.”

John raised his eyebrows in mock innocence. He clutched his chest dramatically. “Who, me?”

The garage’s owner scowled at him. “Manchester, don’t be a bloody wanker. Just get Todd to take the Honda, and meet me in the car park.”

Mudali walked off in the direction of the garage bay door, and after a last quick glance at Rose, John went off in search of Todd. 

~oOo~

Memories of time travel and alien incursions filled Rose’s mind, just serving to remind her of why she was so desperately watching the clock. What with work and the rain they’d been getting, it had been days since she’d visited the TARDIS.

Rose absentmindedly fingered her TARDIS key. Instead of being the comforting presence it usually was, it felt like a weight around her neck. It held all the anxiety she felt about the Doctor and Mickey not being back yet as well as all the guilt she had about not going often enough to check on the time ship. 

But it was more than just anxiety and guilt that she felt. There was an ache in her heart, a longing for the ship that she wasn’t sure entirely came from herself. 

It was as if the TARDIS was reaching out to Rose.

Part of her said that was impossible. The ship was linked with the Doctor, not her. But she knew the TARDIS was at least semi-sentient. And she was ill. And alone.

She needed to go see her. There wasn’t much else she could do for the TARDIS, but at least she could do that. 

If only she could get away.

Thoughts of the tall blue box returned her thoughts to the box’s owner, the one that was a study in the color brown: brown pinstriped suit, dark brown eyes, thick brown hair. Oh, she missed him. It wasn’t just the traveling she missed. She missed _him_.

She immediately felt another wave of guilt. She loved John. They were shagging. They were even living together.

And he _was_ the Doctor. Even if he didn’t know it.

If only there was some way of knowing that the Doctor—her brown, pinstriped Doctor—was all right. With her old mobile not working the only way she would know for sure was when he came back. 

But when the Doctor returned, her time with John would be over. And that she couldn’t bear to think about. 

Still lost in thought, Rose picked up the pile of invoices and slowly walked to the file cabinet. As she opened the first drawer, the sound of someone calling her name made her jump. She whirled around guiltily, clutching the papers in her arms so they wouldn’t fall on the floor.

Abhirati stood in the doorway, one hand on the frame of the door, the other underneath her enormous belly. She often stood like that these days, with one hand or both under her belly, looking like she was trying to hold it up. Rose couldn’t imagine how uncomfortable she must be. This time, however, Abhirati looked more than uncomfortable. She looked exhausted, her face drawn and pale.

“Are you alright?” Rose asked.

“Oh, I’m fine, love.” She gave her a wry grin and walked into the room, now holding her lower back as well as her belly. She sank down onto one of the empty chairs in the waiting area. “Just a bit tired and sore, and ready for all this to be over with. Why don’t you take the rest of the day off? There’s nothing for you to do here, and I’m sure you must be bored out of your mind.”

“Are you sure?” Rose asked. “Because I don’t mind staying. You look like you should be the one going home.”

“I’m fine,” Abhirati said again. “And Daphne’s here to help.” 

Rose frowned. “Where is Daphne?”

The older woman laughed. “She’s helping Bill sort the chaos he created when he tried to straighten the storeroom. Honestly, sometimes I think the man’s more trouble than he’s worth. It’s a good thing he’s so pretty. Or at least Daphne thinks so.”

Rose laughed. Daphne’s crush on the mechanic was an open secret in the garage, and one that only Bill didn’t know. 

“Go ahead,” Abhirati urged. “I’ll be fine.”

Rose hesitated. She glanced at the door to the garage floor thoughtfully, and then out the plate glass window that faced the street. The sight of a bus pulling up to the curb on the opposite side of the road was the deciding factor. She turned back to Abhirati. “Thanks. I do have some errands to do. Would you tell John I’ll see him back at the flat?”

She rushed out of the office.

Moments later she was on the bus, headed in the direction of the TARDIS.

~oOo~

By the time John had made it to the car park next to the garage, Mudali was deep in conversation with someone who was presumably the owner of the midnight blue Mercedes-Benz.

Mudali was right. Whoever he was, the man had money, money enough for handmade suits and silk ties, and money enough for a car that was a work of art: convertible, six speed, state-of-the-art displays, high-end stereo, wood inlays, leather seats… Not to mention it was spotless, obviously washed by hand and waxed to such a glossy finish that he could see himself in a reflection off the bonnet.

“It will start, then it won’t start…” the owner was saying. “They checked the battery, the starter, everything they could think of but their mechanic couldn’t find anything wrong so he recommended your garage…” 

“Well, you came to the right place. John is the best mechanic in London, perhaps in all of England,” Mudali told the owner. “He’s a genius. So good he should be working at Buckingham Palace…” 

John ran a hand along the bonnet, appreciating the silky feel of car wax underneath his fingertips before he popped it open. The engine sparkled. And well maintained. Fluids and filters were clean, spark plugs okay, there were no loose wires, no bad connections…

While Mudali continued to boast about him, he tested the battery. Fully charged. 

Leaving the engine for the moment, he opened the driver's side door and slid behind the wheel. He turned the key in the ignition. Nothing. Dead silence.

He grinned.

"Finally. A challenge," he said to himself.

“I need it tonight,” the owner said to him through the open passenger’s side window. “It’s absolutely vital that I leave on time.” 

As the owner began a long story about exactly why he needed it, John tuned him out. He couldn’t care less about the owner or his problems; it was the car that was interesting. 

As he moved to examine the ignition itself, out of the corner of his eye he spotted someone emerging from the office.

Rose. Headed out, trying to catch the bus.

He’d called it in one.

“Damn it,” he muttered. Sometimes he hated being right.

The car and its owner forgotten, he jumped out of the car and took a step forward, at war with himself, fighting both a fresh wave of jealousy and the urge to chase after her. 

“Oi, where are you going?” the owner protested angrily behind him.

John ignored him. “Rose!” he yelled.

She didn’t react. Instead she continued on her path across the street and disappeared behind the bus. After a moment’s hesitation he rushed forward, but before he could reach it himself, it pulled away.

With a huff of frustration, he stalked back to the building and burst into the office.

Abhirati was sitting on a chair near the door. When she spotted him, she gave him a wan smile, a smile he didn’t return.

“Did Rose say where she was going?” he asked. 

“Errands,” she replied. “She said to tell you she’d see you back at the flat.”

“Errands,” he muttered in disgust. That could mean anything.

After a moment he realized Abhirati was watching him curiously.

“Is everything all right between you two?” she asked.

He flashed her a wide, false grin. “Yep. Absolutely fantastic. Everything is... absolutely fantastic.”

~oOo~

Rose glanced up and down the crowded street. 

_Good. No one’s looking_ , she thought. 

She ducked into the alley where the TARDIS was parked. She didn’t want to do anything that could draw attention to the Doctor’s ship, and every once in a while she got the impression someone was watching her. There was never anyone there, but she wasn’t stupid; she always double-checked. She knew from experience that you couldn’t be too careful.

After all, you never knew if there was going to be a werewolf or something behind you.

She made her way down the narrow passageway to the TARDIS, sidestepping wheelie bins and cast off shipping crates on the way. She’d put them there herself, dragged them from other parts of the alley in an effort to block the view of the TARDIS from the street. It was only partially successful; you could still see the ship from the mouth of the alley, but you had to know she was there and really be looking for her. 

Once she reached the TARDIS, she gently laid her hand on the time ship's door. “How are you doing today?”

The light on the top of the TARDIS flashed at her in greeting, but so weakly that she could barely see it, even in the shadows created by the buildings on either side of her. 

Rose sighed. Every time she came the TARDIS seemed weaker than before. She moved her hand and rubbed the TARDIS’s side in an effort to be comforting.

“I wish I could help you,” she said. “I just don’t know how.”

The light flashed again. 

Rose blinked. This time the flash seemed more like a deliberate attempt at communication from the TARDIS rather than just a general reaction to her presence. 

“Are… are you trying to talk to me?”

Her eyes grew round with shock when the TARDIS’s light flashed once more. Even though she knew the TARDIS could get inside her mind, could even understand her sometimes, it hadn’t occurred to her that the ship might be able to actually communicate with her.

“Um, is there something I _can_ do to help you?”

This time the light remained dark. Rose bit her lip thoughtfully.

“Does that mean there isn’t anything I can do for you?”

Another flash.

She sighed, deflated. “Finally able to talk to you and there still isn’t anything I can do to help.”

The TARDIS remained dark. Rose sank down onto a box she’d put next to the ship weeks earlier, to give herself somewhere to sit when she came to visit. She leaned back against the wall of the ship and fingered her TARDIS key.

“I wish I knew if the Doctor was okay. Not your Doctor, I know he’s okay, he’s just human right now. I meant my Doctor.”

As she spoke, the wall of the TARDIS behind her slowly warmed, as if the ship was trying to comfort her. It worked. She let her head fall backwards, resting it against the ship. 

“Well, they’re both my Doctor, I suppose. Always have been, I guess. And especially these days.” She smiled at the thought. “But I meant my proper Doctor, in my proper time stream. He’s been gone so long, him and Mickey both, and I just wish I knew if they’re all right. Wherever they are.”

The wall grew noticeably warmer. She turned and placed a hand on the wall, and immediately jerked her hand back. It was hot to the touch. Startled, she jumped up off the box and stared at the ship.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

The ship’s light flashed.

“Then why are you doing an impression of a hot plate? You trying to tell me something?”

Flash.

“What could you… Hold on. Are you trying to tell me they’re all right?”

When the light flashed again, her heart pounded.

“How do you…” 

Rose’s mind raced. How could the TARDIS possibly know that? 

But then the Doctor said that even he didn’t know how powerful his ship was. 

Rose thought about all the incredible things she knew the TARDIS could do, all the things she’d seen with her own eyes. She could travel to distant galaxies and different times in the blink of an eye. She could get inside your head and translate for you. She could turn Margaret the Slitheen back into an egg. Even while she was sick she’d managed to turn the Doctor human and call his future self for help.

She slammed a hand against her forehead. “If you could call to us in your own future and bring us back here, why should I be surprised that you can know that? So they’re okay? They’re really okay?”

The light flashed again. 

“When are they going to be back?” The light remained dark. “Well, that was stupid. If you can only communicate with me by lighting up and not lighting up, that means only yes or no questions.” She paused thoughtfully. “Are they going to be back soon?” The light remained dark. “Does that mean they aren’t going to be back soon, or that you don’t know?” There was no response from the TARDIS. She shook her head. “Yes or no questions,” she reminded herself. “How do I ask this? Let me see… Do you know if they are going to be back soon?”

To her disappointment, the light remained dark. She frowned. “I don’t get it. If you know that they’re okay, how come you don’t know if they’re going to be back soon or not?”

After the TARDIS didn’t respond again, she realized her mistake. 

“Oh, yeah, that wasn’t a yes or no question. Hmm, let me think. What was it the Doctor said when we first got here? Something about time being different for Time Lords?” She searched her memories. “Let’s see. Mickey said something about how he knew everything was going to be okay since the Doctor was still there or something. But the Doctor said that what was happening now was happening. And when we were in Cardiff with the Gelth, the Doctor said that time twisted and turned. So that means… what? That whatever is going to happen hasn’t happened yet?” 

She looked up at the TARDIS for confirmation, and its light flashed.

“But they’re okay now?”

The light flashed once again, and Rose sighed in relief. She flung her arms around the ship and felt a fresh wave of warmth emanating from the ship, as if the TARDIS was trying to hug her back.

It didn’t solve anything, the TARDIS was still sick and John was still human, but at least she knew that right now, the Doctor and Mickey were okay.

Wherever they were.


	32. Chapter Thirty-One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was getting way too long (almost 8k and not finished), so I decided to split it into two parts. The second part is almost finished, so I hope to get it done and posted by next weekend.
> 
> I also want to thank you all for sticking with this story and for faithfully reviewing even when I haven't had an opportunity to respond. I really appreciate it.

**Chapter Thirty-One – London, 25 August, 2007**

“So I don’t have anyone to talk to about any of this,” Rose said. She was sitting cross-legged on the wooden crate she’d pushed next to the TARDIS with her back against the time ship’s door. Somehow sitting there was comforting, more comforting than almost anywhere else in the world; it was like she could feel the ship reaching out to her there, wrapping her in a telepathic hug. “I mean, I can’t talk to my friends. Most of them don’t even know about the Doctor. Keisha sort of does, well at least she’s met him, but she’s not here. And things were kinda weird between us last time I saw her. But even if they weren’t, she doesn’t know he’s an alien, and she really wouldn’t understand about regeneration and stuff. And Mickey…” She sighed. “Even if he _was_ here, I couldn’t talk to him about _this_. I mean, how could I talk to my ex-boyfriend about this? And same with Mum. She just wouldn’t understand. I mean, she doesn’t even like the Doctor.”

She paused thoughtfully. “Sarah Jane is here. And she did tell me I could come and talk to her if I needed to…” Her voice trailed off as her mind returned to meeting the Doctor’s former companion. They’d become friends in the end, but it certainly hadn’t started that way. She shook her head. “No. I just can’t. I think… I think she was in love with him. How do I talk to her about my shagging the Doctor… particularly about shagging the Doctor when he doesn’t even know he _is_ him.” 

Rose dropped her head back, resting it on the TARDIS, and let out a groan. “Oh, God, what do I do when the Doctor comes back? I mean, I want him to come back, and I want you to get better, but when that happens I lose John. I just…” She drew in a ragged breath and fought the tears that sprang to her eyes. “When the Doctor comes back, I’m gonna lose this Doctor again. And I don’t know how I can do that again. It was so hard the first time, and that was before… before we…”

She shook her head vigorously and forced the thoughts from her mind. “Anyway, when the Doctor comes back, I’m gonna have to go back to just being friends with him, pretend nothing happened. I don’t know how I’m gonna do that either.” She took a deep breath and let it out in a rush. “Of course, that’s assuming he doesn’t remember all this. If he does remember, I won’t have to worry about going back to just being friends. He’ll just kick me out. Leave me behind just like he did Sarah Jane.” 

She paused for a moment as her words sunk in. She hadn’t allowed herself to think about it, but the thought, the fear, of being left behind had been there in the back of her mind ever since she and John had started shagging.

No. To be brutally honest, it had begun long before that, even before he’d regenerated, ever since he’d sent her away from the Game Station. Then after he’d regenerated, he’d changed so much… she’d been convinced he’d leave her behind. Things had got better for a while; he’d even flat out told her that she could stay with him for the rest of her life, that he wouldn’t leave her like he had the others. 

And then came a spaceship with windows into 18th century France, clockwork monsters, a heroic rescue of a beautiful, accomplished member of French aristocracy…

And he’d left her without a backwards glance. 

As he would undoubtedly do if he ever found out about the extent of her relationship with John. She was sure he’d see it as an unforgivable betrayal of his trust in her. 

“That’s what I’m the most scared of,” she admitted quietly. “That when the Doctor comes back, I’m not just gonna lose John, I’m gonna lose both of them.”

Rose fell silent, thinking about her oh, so complicated relationship with the Doctor, how while they ran hand-in-hand from adventure to adventure, he’d run hot and cold with her, treating her like she was the most important person in the universe one minute, throwing up Mickey and Reinette as barriers between them the next. Why did he do that? 

She closed her eyes and listened to the sounds of the estate, the sounds of traffic and people and music filtering into the alley from the street. The sounds she’d grown up with. The normal sounds of human life on Earth.

And then, like a bolt of lightning the answer came to her. She was human… and he wasn’t. Seeing Sarah Jane again, seeing for himself the effects of the march of time, seeing how his former companion—his former human companion—had aged over the years, had deeply shaken the Doctor. It had struck him how short their own time was together. That was when he’d talked about “The Curse of the Time Lords”, about how he’d have to continue on alone after he inevitably lost her.

Like she would have to do when the Doctor came back and she lost John.

He was trying to protect his hearts. 

The realization made everything crystal clear. It wasn’t that he didn’t care for her; it was that he cared too much. He was scared of losing her the same way she was afraid of losing him, and he was pulling away in order to protect himself from how much it would hurt when she was gone. She understood—all too well in fact—but that wasn’t what she was going to do. She wasn't going to pull away. No, if she was going to lose him, she was going to make the most of every single second they had together.

Starting right now. She’d make something nice for tea. No takeaway, no hot dogs, and definitely no beans on toast. It wasn’t much, but it was something.

Rose stood and stretched, for the first time noticing how the shadows had shifted, and she wondered just exactly how long she’d been there in the alley. Judging by the soreness of her bum, caused by sitting on the hard crate, she guessed it had been at least a couple of hours. She turned and patted the TARDIS.

“I’ve got to get going,” she said. “Got to get to the market before I go home.” To her surprise, the light on the TARDIS’s roof remained dark. Usually the TARDIS flashed her light at Rose both when she arrived and when she left. She frowned. Had communicating with her exhausted the ship, or was the TARDIS worse than she had realized? She laid a hand on the wood of the ship’s side. To her relief, she felt a surge of quiet and warmth and peace, almost as if the TARDIS was sleeping. Did time-and-space ships sleep?

She hoped so. At least she hoped that was all that was. She’d never forgive herself if her conversation with the TARDIS had somehow made the ship worse.

Not wanting to disturb her, Rose turned and quietly made her way down the alley, but just before she exited onto the street, she glanced back at the ship.

A ray of sunlight, bouncing off an upper window somewhere, broke through the intermittent cloud cover and shone down, illuminating the ship. For a moment, the blue of its wooden walls seemed to glow. It felt like an omen, but of good or bad she didn’t know.

She shivered. 

~oOo~

John made his way across the estate, slowly traversing the short distance from the garage to his flat. He had an odd mixture of dread and jealousy and fear in the pit of his stomach, one that grew with every step he took. Every time Rose left he wondered if that was it, if that was the last time he would see her. If this was the time she’d run off again, possibly never to return. He knew the fear was irrational, but it was still there, it still existed, and denying it did no good.

While he’d been at work, he’d been able to concentrate on the task at hand, to ignore his worry about his relationship with Rose. He’d discovered he was a genius at compartmentalizing. But now with that distraction gone, his jealousy returned with a vengeance and his mind spun out of control. Why didn’t she ever tell him where she was going when she disappeared? What was she doing? And it wasn’t “errands”. He was a lot of things, but stupid wasn’t one of them. There were only so many errands someone could do. She had to be meeting someone. And it wasn’t her mother. She always told him when she was going to see Jackie. The fact that she never talked about where she went—didn’t tell him she was meeting with Shareen or Rita or Susie or any of her other, seemingly numerous, mates from school—spoke volumes. She had to be meeting with someone she didn’t want him to know about.

He could do the math. That all added up to the Doctor.

He knew that what he should do was confront her, just ask her flat out where she was going— _was the Doctor back?_ —but deep down, he knew he couldn’t do it. What if she refused to tell him? That would create a wedge between them, could even spell the end of their relationship. No, he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t risk losing her over something as trivial as his peace of mind.

Instead he was going with Plan B. Sweep her off her feet, make her forget whomever it was she was meeting.

Make her forget the Doctor.

He wasn’t sure that was even possible. If the Doctor came back, no, _when_ he came back—assuming he wasn’t back already—surely she’d go off with him again. And who could blame her? Her perfect Doctor, who traveled the world saving people. And what did he do? Repair car engines. Unclog toilets. Fix pensioners’ sinks.

There was no way he could compete with him. But he had to try.

As John climbed the stairs of his building, his mind returned to the contents of his back pocket, a gift from the Mercedes’ owner. It had turned out that the Mercedes had had an odd problem, one he’d never seen before but one that was easily fixed. There had been a flaw within the battery itself, a loose terminal that sometimes made contact, sometimes not, causing it to periodically not work even though the battery was fully charged. Once he’d discovered that, it was a simple matter of just swapping it out with a new one. The car’s owner, who also turned out to be the owner of a West End theater, had been so grateful that he’d solved the problem that he’d given him a couple of tickets—very good tickets—to that night’s otherwise sold out performance. Not one to follow the theater, he’d never heard of the show but its name, _We Will Rock You_ , sounded promising. A quick internet search on the computer at the garage had told him the show had mixed reviews, but free tickets were free tickets. That, combined with dinner in Chinatown, would make a nice evening out.

It was nothing compared to traveling the world, but it was a start.

He pulled his key out of the pocket of his jeans and let himself into the flat. Rose’s voice filtered into the hall from somewhere. He felt a wave of relief, and it was only then that it occurred to him how nervous he’d been that she wouldn’t be there. 

But then it struck him; she was talking to someone. She wasn't alone. Someone else was here. He frowned as a fresh wave of jealousy threatened to overtake him.

“Rose?” he called. 

“Kitchen,” she called back.

John walked down the hall and opened the door to the kitchen. When he saw Rose, he breathed a sigh of relief. 

Rose was alone in the room. One of the cabinets stood open, and several sacks—from the butcher’s and the grocer’s by the look of the steaks, bananas, and other items—were spread out on the counter. She _had_ been doing errands, just like she’d told Abhirati she was going to do. He felt a twinge of guilt at not trusting her.

“You’re spoiled rotten, you know that?” she said.

His eyebrows shot up until he realized Rose wasn’t talking to him. Instead, hands on hips, she was staring down at The Cat. 

The Cat, whom he still wouldn’t admit lived with them, also still did not officially have a name. Rose had tried to name her; she’d called her Blackie, Midnight, Ebony… she’d even called her Fluffy for a time, but nothing had stuck, and The Cat was still The Cat. The lack of a proper name didn’t seem to bother The Cat; she came and went as she always did, showing up for meals, bedtime, and the occasional cuddle on movie night, and John sincerely doubted that if she had been properly christened that she’d have come when called anyway.

He chuckled. The Cat was ignoring Rose; instead she was staring at the small bowl that lay on the floor in front of her. Filled with tuna, he guessed, based on the smell and the open tin on the counter. 

“Well, I’ve been called a lot of things, but spoiled rotten is a new one,” he said.

Rose shot him a look over her shoulder. “Not you. Her.” She gestured at The Cat. “They were out of tuna last time, so I bought her sardines, and now she won’t eat the tuna.” She harrumphed and turned back to The Cat. “You’re not getting anything else, so you might as well eat it.”

“Fool’s errand,” he told her. “It’s your own fault, you know. Shouldn’t have fed her the sardines. Cats get spoiled faster than any other creature on Earth. Other than humans, that is.”

She shot him another look. “Watch it; you’re insulting my whole… I mean, our… whole species.”

He grinned at her. “If the shoe fits…” 

She rolled her eyes. As she began to put away some of the groceries—butter, semi-skimmed milk, a wedge of cheese—he began to empty the other bags that sat on the counter. He pulled out another tin and made a face when he saw what it contained.

“Beans?”

She snatched the tin out of his hand and stowed it in the cabinet along with the tins of tuna, cellophane-wrapped pot noodles, and a box of tea she’d purchased. “Just because you don’t like them… Oh, don’t put those away. That’s dinner.”

“No, it’s not,” he told her, putting the steaks in the fridge. “We’re going out.”

“We are?”

“Yep.”

“But I had plans…” she protested. He quickly glanced around the kitchen and noticed that still on the counter were things that, along with the steaks, would make for a very nice dinner: some potatoes, a head of lettuce, a bottle of wine. There was even a banana cream pie—his favorite—for afters. 

“And fantastic plans too, from the looks of it. But all of this’ll keep. My plans won’t, and we’ve got to get going, so you best get changed.”

“Where are we going?” she asked.

“It’s a surprise,” he answered. He crossed his arms across his chest and showered her with a pleased-as-punch smile. 

Her brow furrowed and she stared at him, clearly trying to read something from his expression. If he didn’t know better, he’d have thought she was trying to read his mind. Finally she crossed her own arms, mimicking his position. “If I don’t know where we’re going,” she said, “how do I know what to wear?”

She obviously thought she’d scored some sort of point, but she was competing against a master.

“Nope, ‘s not gonna work,” he told her. “Wear something dressy, but not too dressy. No jeans.” He let his eyes wander up and down her body. “No matter how good your arse looks in them.”

She grinned cheekily. “Well, then I’ve got to go to Mum’s. Gotta find something that makes my arse look as good as my jeans do.” She sashayed out of the room, said arse swaying provocatively as she moved.

When she had gone, he slowly blew out the breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. She was going to be the death of him. He knew it. 

But what a way to go.


	33. Chapter Thirty-Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I want to thank you all for the fabulous response I got from my last chapter. I mentioned last time that the chapter was getting too long so I split it, but today I decided to split the chapter in three parts rather than two. I also decided to post this now because the end of this month and the whole of the next are going to be really busy. Bit of a cliffie with this one, but I'm still hoping to post the next chapter next weekend if possible.
> 
> Someone asked in a review on a different website whether _We Will Rock You_ was an actual musical. It was, and it did play in London in 2007 to mixed reviews. Whether or not the owner of the theater had a Mercedes, however, I have no idea.

**Chapter Thirty-Two – London, 25 August, 2007**

"Rose Tyler, aren't you out of the shower yet?" John hollered through the bathroom door.

In the fifteen minutes Rose had been at her mum's, looking for something to wear, he'd not only managed to shower and shave, but he'd also changed into his black trousers, black boots, and dark red jumper. Rose, on the other hand, had been in the bathroom over half an hour, and the shower was still going.

"What?" she yelled back, her voice muffled by the sound of the running water.

"We've got to go!"

"Five more minutes!"

"That's what you said five minutes ago! We're going to be late!"

"Yeah, but late for what?"

He let out a huff of exasperation. "Never you mind. Just finish up, all right?"

"Five more minutes!"

John rolled his eyes. He briefly considered just going in the bathroom and hauling her out of the shower, but he had a sneaking suspicion that if he were to try, it would lead to him joining her rather than her getting out. Tempting, but it would just make them later than they already were.

He paced a couple of times up and down in what passed for a hallway in their tiny flat, from the kitchen to the front door and back again. Restless by nature, he didn't like doing nothing; sitting still was boring, and being bored made him irritable. He'd already put away the groceries, put The Cat out, and tidied the tiny living room—ignoring the domesticity of his actions while he did so. He could always watch telly—it was better than sitting around doing nothing, he supposed—but it usually bored him as well. It was a showcase of the stupidity of the human race: newsreaders reporting on the political crisis of the day, talk shows filled with inane discussions of unimportant topics, dramas about stupid people in stupid situations that they'd created themselves by doing stupid things. Movies were a little better, but he didn't have time to watch one. They were late enough as it was.

On his way up the hall, he again stopped in front of the bathroom door. "Hurry up, Rose," he yelled.

"Five more minutes!"

He sighed in defeat. Five more minutes undoubtedly meant fifteen; even if she got out of the shower that instant she'd still have to dress and do her makeup. Not that she needed it, of course; in his opinion she was loveliest first thing in the morning, fresh out of the shower, her face clean and still slightly pink from the heat of the water. Of course she was gorgeous with it on as well, she was always gorgeous to him, and if she wanted to wear it, far be it from him to tell her not to.

Well, as long as he had to wait, he could do something productive, he decided, namely research one Dr. James McCrimmon. If he was going to compete with him for Rose, he needed to know more about his rival.

It wouldn't be the first time he'd looked up the man on the internet, but so far he'd had no luck finding him, not on any of the standard websites, not on social media or banking sites or government registries. He'd even hacked into MI-5 and MI-6. McCrimmon didn't have a bank account, or an NHS card, or a mortgage, or a driver's license. He had no employment history. He had no record of ever graduating, or even attending, a university, or even any school at all, anywhere in Great Britain. Although there were any number of men with the same name in the country, none were the right age or had the right schooling to be him. Early on he _had_ found one who'd initially seemed to be a possibility, a 40-year-old doctor of obstetrics from Edinburgh, but he'd quickly ruled the man out. _That_ James McCrimmon was married with 2.4 children—his wife was four months gone into her third pregnancy—and he hadn't taken a trip out of the country since he'd done his gap year in France twenty years earlier.

Definitely not Rose's Doctor.

And John was nothing if not thorough. He hadn't limited himself to UK websites. He'd searched government websites from Ireland, Canada, Australia… he'd even hacked the CIA. And nothing. McCrimmon didn't seem to exist on the internet any more than he himself did.

It had occurred to John early on in his search that perhaps the name James McCrimmon was an assumed name. Unlike his own moniker, John Smith, a name so common it sounded false and one he still wasn't sure was his own, the name James McCrimmon was perfect as an alias: common enough in the English-speaking world, yet not so common that it drew unwanted attention. 

But if Rose's Doctor was so perfect, why would he use an alias? People who used assumed names were usually hiding from someone or something. They didn't go around doing good deeds; there was too much of a risk drawing attention to themselves.

On the other hand, Dr. James McCrimmon seemed to have no official identity, certainly not one that could be easily found, and according to Rose, never stayed in one place for long. 

Almost like he was on the run.

He snorted at the thought. He was being ridiculous. The man was probably exactly what Rose said he was, a good man who used his gifts to help people. 

But that didn't explain why he couldn't find him on the internet.

If McCrimmon was an alias, given the information John had on him—a doctor whose nickname was "the Doctor" and who traveled the world helping people—he probably would never find him. It just wasn't enough to go on. If only he had something else. Anything else. A picture, a mention in a newspaper…

But there had been, he remembered in a rush. McCrimmon had been mentioned in the newspaper article about Rose's disappearance. But the story in the newspaper was decidedly unhelpful. There'd been no photo accompanying the article, no name mentioned; the article had just said that the man was believed to have been in his late thirties or early forties. That could be anybody. With that description, it could even have been him. 

But it was a starting point. Perhaps he'd missed something, some small article on Rose's reappearance that had more information on the man who she'd traveled with.

The shower was still running, so he headed to the bedroom, intent on spending a few minutes on his computer. He stopped short in the doorway.

Rose had definitely been here. The place was a disaster: clothes strewn all over the floor, bureau drawers open and overflowing, her clothes for the evening draped over the chair in front of the computer, her rucksack on the bed, open and spilling over with more clothes. And that wasn't counting the things she had in the wardrobe. Or at her mother's. How many clothes did she own anyway?

His mouth twisted into a small grin. Normally the mess would have aggravated him, but not now. Every misplaced item, every out-of-place hair tie, every misplaced sock, every cast-off bra and every stray pair of knickers—particularly the knickers, he thought, chuckling to himself—was evidence that she was here, in his life, sharing his home. Sharing his bed. Before he'd met Rose he'd been alone, but it wasn't until now that he realized just how lonely he'd been.

(And say what you want about Dr. James McCrimmon, he might be a genius, he might even be a saint who saved the world six times before breakfast, but Rose wasn't with the Doctor, she was with him.)

But the same mess that was evidence of Rose in his life was also preventing him from even getting to his computer, let alone allowing him to work at it. In an effort to tame some of the chaos, he picked up a pile of her things off the floor, dumped them into a laundry basket in the corner, and closed the bureau drawers. Then he surveyed the room. Better, but not enough.

As he began to shove some of her stuff back in the rucksack, his hand hit a couple of hard things buried deep within the bag. Curious, he pulled them out. His brow furrowed when he saw what they were. One was her old mobile phone. Why would she be keeping her old phone in her rucksack? In fact, why keep it at all? It certainly didn't work; that's why she got a new one. 

Inwardly shrugging at the incomprehensible puzzle that was Rose, he shoved it back in the rucksack and turned to the other item. It was a plain white cube the size of his fist, completely unmarked, made of something he didn't recognize. It sort of looked like the type of manufactured material they sometimes used for kitchen counters as an inexpensive substitute for granite, but the feel was wrong. It had a soft, silky texture rather than the hard, slick feel he was familiar with.

He turned it over in his hands. There was a tiny rough spot on what he guessed was the bottom of the cube; it appeared to be an on/off switch. Maybe it was some sort of nightlight, he thought; maybe it glowed when turned on, although he couldn't see a place where batteries would go. He pushed the switch with his thumb, but nothing happened.

Well, if it was a nightlight, maybe the batteries were dead.

It occurred to him that instead of a nightlight, it could be a puzzle box, similar to the ones that they sold in Chinatown. You pushed parts of the sides of the box back and forth in a specific order and the box would open, revealing a secret compartment you could hide things in. If that was what it was, it was probably just a souvenir from Rose's world travels.

He played with it for another minute or so, his mind running through numerous other possibilities of what the object could be before he gave up. He didn't want Rose to catch him snooping through her things.

He put the cube back in her rucksack, zipped it up, and put it on the floor next to the laundry basket before turning back to finish tidying the bed. As he bent down to pick up her pillow, knocked on the floor in her rush to get ready for work that morning, he noticed Rose's key on the bedside table, the one she wore on a chain around her neck. It lay in a pile of her other things: her new phone and her hoop earrings, her wallet and her Oyster card, a key ring, and a small pile of coins. He pulled the key ring out, careful not to spill the money all over the place. There were three keys on it, two of which he recognized since they were identical to his: the one to his flat and the one to the garage. The third resembled his in size, shape, and color, but was cut slightly differently. He strongly suspected it was to Jackie's flat.

He frowned. He'd always assumed that the key she wore was to her mum's flat, but now he wondered. If this was the key to Jackie's place, what was the other one?

He set the key ring down on the table. As his hand neared the other key, for an instant it appeared to glow. His eyebrows shot up.

"What was that?" he murmured. Instinctively he looked around, trying to find the source of the light, and spotted the open window on the opposite side of the room. The clouds had shifted and sunlight was now streaming through the window, creating a large rectangle of light on the bed. The sunlight didn't appear to reach the bedside table, but it must have done.

"Trick of the light," he told himself.

He picked up the key and examined it, turning it over and over in his hands. It felt warm to the touch, undoubtedly from sitting in the sunlight, but otherwise there was absolutely nothing remarkable about it. It was just a standard Yale key.

Then he turned his attention to the thin chain that held it. It was made of multiple thin strands of a silvery metal, each only slightly thicker than thread, tightly and intricately woven together. Incredibly fine workmanship, and definitely handmade. No machine could produce something like this.

He pulled on the chain, first gently and then slightly harder, testing its tensile strength. Beautiful and strong. And made of a metal he couldn't immediately identify. There were no signs of tarnish, not a single spot, and it wasn't as shiny as silver anyway. Not as soft as white gold, and it didn't appear to be platinum either.

Strange that such a commonplace item like a key should be hanging from something so unusual, so exquisite. What was so important about the key that she should wear it around her neck on a chain that looked to be worth a fortune?

And where did she get the chain anyway? It looked to be worth more than his flat. More than her mum's flat. Perhaps even more than both their flats put together. Definitely not something she could have got in a shop on the estate, maybe not even in all of London.

Thoughtfully he held the key up by the chain at eye level. It slowly rotated back and forth, glittering in the sunlight. He felt oddly drawn to it, almost as if it was calling to something deep within him. It was mesmerizing. There was just something about it, something that seemed so familiar…

He vigorously shook his head, breaking the spell. He wasn't one for flights of fancy. A key calling to him? It was ridiculous.

As he unceremoniously dropped the key back on the bedside table, he heard movement behind him. The shower wasn't running anymore, hadn't been running for a couple of minutes. He'd been so preoccupied he hadn't consciously noticed.

"'S about time you got out," he said. When she didn't answer, he turned to face her—and his heart stopped.

Rose stood in the doorway, wrapped only in a towel, her hair pinned up to keep it dry while she'd been in the shower. She met his eyes.

The towel dropped.


	34. Chapter Thirty-Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is NSFW.

**Chapter Thirty-Three – London, 25 August, 2007**

At the sight of Rose in all of her feminine glory, John was instantly, suddenly, fully erect. His cock pressed desperately, almost painfully against the inside of his trousers, seeking release from its confinement. 

He was aware he was staring but was completely unable to stop himself. Their relationship was still so new; he still wasn’t used to seeing her like this: the creamy perfection of her skin, the fullness of her breasts, the curve of her hips. A little voice in the back of his mind whispered that he’d never tire of the sight, not if he lived to be ten thousand.

She was so, so beautiful.

He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, trying to rein in his emotions and get his hormones under control. He was only partly successful. “Rose, we’re going to be late for dinner.”

“I’m not hungry,” she said. Her voice was low, her tone seductive. “Are you?”

He chuckled ruefully. “No. I have to admit, food is the last thing on my mind.”

Rose gave him a cheeky grin, the tip of her tongue peeking out from between her teeth. “Well then.” 

She pulled the pins from her hair, causing it to cascade down onto her shoulders, and crossed the room to stand in front of him. Her hands moved to the button of his trousers. 

“I believe you are overdressed for the occasion,” she said, rising to her toes and pressing her lips to his. He pulled her into his arms, one hand moving to tangle his fingers in her hair, the other to slide from her shoulder downward to cup her arse. As they deepened the kiss—slow, gentle, with mouths open and tongues gently touching—she unzipped him and slid her hand into his pants, carefully pulling them down just low enough for him to spring free. Her small hand encircled him; the touch of her fingers against his sensitive flesh caused his cock to jump. He groaned. 

After a moment—a totally blissful moment—she let go of him and gently pushed him away. He began to pull off his jumper, but she stopped him, placing her hands over his. She shook her head.

“Changed my mind,” she said. “Leave it on and sit down.” When he didn’t instantly comply, she pushed against his chest. “Sit. Down.” Obediently he sat down on the edge of the bed, curious as to what she had in mind. She glanced around the room. She must not have seen what she was looking for because she frowned. She shook her finger at him. “Don’t move.”

Puzzled, he watched as she left the room. He felt stupid sitting there, undone and with a raging hard-on. To his relief she immediately returned, and to his surprise she was carrying his leather jacket. She held it out to him.

“Put this on.”

As he slipped on the jacket, his mouth quirked in amusement. “I thought you said I was overdressed. Leather fetish?” 

“Fantasy of mine.” She knelt in front of him. “Of course this isn’t the right venue, but it’ll do.”

“Where’s the right—” he began, and then moaned as he felt her mouth on him.

All coherent thought fled. Hot, he thought. Wet. He dropped his hands onto the bed behind him, propping himself up and holding himself steady. He instinctively thrust upward. One of her hands moved to his hip to hold him still.

She tightened her lips around him and gently pulled backwards before releasing him and sitting up straight. Convinced this exquisite torture was over, he opened his mouth to protest, but the words died on his lips when she gently blew on him. The cool air after the heat of her mouth was shocking to his sensitive flesh, and a fresh wave of desire shot through him. He clutched at the sheets behind him; unable to control himself, he thrust forward again. Of its own accord his cock sought her mouth, desperate for relief.

She looked up at him and met his eyes. “Don’t move,” she scolded. He nodded, unable to speak.

She dropped her head, taking him deeper this time, before slowly pulling upward, oh so gently scraping her lower teeth against the underside of his cock as she did so, and then dipped her head again. And again. Unable to help himself, he pressed his hips upwards against her hand. She held him down, her fingertips curling under his trousers and into his hip, hard enough to leave a mark, reminding him of her order to stay still, and he forced himself to obey. A natural born leader in all things, he usually took the lead in their lovemaking as well; her taking charge like this was incredibly erotic. 

She ran the tip of her tongue along the underside of his erection and upward, swirling around the head of his cock before again taking him in her mouth. Gritting his teeth, he forced himself to remain still. She moved the hand on his hip to again cup his balls. As she ever so gently squeezed, she moved the other to grasp his shaft. Her thumb rubbed firmly up and down the back of his cock, from the base upward to where her mouth surrounded him.

“Fantastic,” he breathed. 

Her mouth and hands worked in tandem, quicker and quicker and quicker, rubbing and stroking and licking and squeezing, dipping her fingers to massage that sensitive flesh between his scrotum and anus before returning to his balls, and, oh, now she’d begun sucking too, harder and harder and harder. The tension built and built, higher and higher and higher, starting in his balls and spreading outward to his cock, to his stomach and thighs and chest and calves and oh, he was close, so very, very close. As she took him deeper, one of his hands moved to thread his fingers through her hair, needing to keep her there, exactly there, keep her doing what she was doing, while his mouth moved of his own accord, in turn praising and cursing and calling on the names of deities he didn’t believe in and please don’t stop, don’t ever stop, only to be replaced by nonsense syllables, words in a nonexistent language, a language he didn’t understand, that no one could understand, that no one would ever understand.

And then with a shout he was coming, and coming and coming and coming, coming so hard he could see stars, galaxies, the turn of the universe.

Once it was over, John collapsed on the bed and closed his eyes, chest heaving, his lungs desperate for air, his heart threatening to pound right out of his chest. “Rose Tyler,” he gasped. “That was… bloody fantastic.”

“What’s the matter, old man?” she asked cheekily. “Did I wear you out?”

He opened his eyes and shot her a look. She grinned at him with her tongue caught between her teeth. 

“Nope. Impossible to wear me out,” he said, mindful that the fact he was still trying to catch his breath was contradicting his words. “I’ll show you who wears out who.” The effort to hold his head up became too much, and he dropped it back on the bed. “Just give me a mo.”

She laughed as she crawled up onto the bed. 

He forced himself to a seated position, not easily because his arms were still shaking, and automatically began to undress. He stopped almost immediately, his jacket only half off, and glanced at her.

“All right with you if I take this off now? Or is there more to this fantasy that I don’t know about?”

“You can take it off,” she told him.

He quickly shucked his clothing and joined her on the bed. “So what’s with me wearing my jacket?”

“Well,” she began as he, now naked himself, lay down next to her. “That’s what you wore when I first met you. Your leather jacket and that jumper.”

He stared at her, puzzled. They’d met at the garage, and he never wore jumpers to work.

No, that wasn’t right. They’d met the night Henrik’s had exploded two years ago. She’d told him that; they’d first met a couple of years ago, in that part of his life he couldn’t remember. It was unsettling, her remembering something that had happened to the two of them that he couldn’t.

“So you wanted to jump me when we met?” His voice held more than a trace of amusement.

“Well, no, not that minute. We were sort of busy at the time, escaping the… the building blowing up and all.”

“Yeah, I suppose that would put a damper on things.” He paused, remembering something else she’d said earlier. “So you never answered, where’s the right venue?”

“What?”

“Right before… well, _before_ … you said that this wasn’t the right venue. So where is?”

She hesitated, biting her lip and looking away from him. “Well, sometimes when you’re fixing the… a…a car, or working on a… a sink, or something… and you’re lying on your back, halfway under it, and I think, well…” She blushed. Truly, properly blushed. She turned the color of her namesake.

He smirked. “Think I’m sexy, do you?”

She met his eyes. “Well, yeah. Would think that was obvious considering… After all, I don’t do that with just anyone, y’know. Only dead sexy mechanics with gorgeous blue eyes and big ears.”

“And leather jackets?”

She rolled her eyes. “Well, _that_ goes without sayin’.” She cocked her head and looked at him. “So, what about you?” 

“What about me?”

“Any fantasies I should know about?”

His mind immediately flashed to a fantasy he had, one that had begun as a recurring dream, so vivid that it was now haunting his waking hours as well.

_He was in a cave—but it wasn’t a cave that had ever existed in reality. The round, cavernous room looked more grown than created by geologic processes, with walls that glowed a golden orange and were covered in odd, round indentations, and tall, strangely branched columns, growing from the floor and appearing to hold up the curved, vaulted ceiling._

_Perhaps the strangest thing of all was the large, six-sided, mushroom-like structure that dominated the center of the room. Like all dreamscapes, it made no sense. It was covered in switches and levers, flashing lights and glowing dials. A bicycle pump, serving no discernable purpose, was built into one of the panels, and, incongruously, an old-fashioned telephone receiver was set in the center of another. A tall, glass column, glowing a greenish-blue, rose from the direct center of the mushroom and stretched towards the ceiling._

_Rose stood in front of him, wearing the dress she’d worn to the wedding. He pulled her into his arms and kissed her hungrily, a starving man at a feast. As she dropped her head backwards, he devoured her, lips and teeth and tongue tracing the column of her neck from her jaw to her collarbone._

_Without moving his lips from her throat, he walked her backwards until her back rested against one of the columns, pressing himself tightly against her, pushing his erection hard against her belly. She moaned and pressed back, writhing against him, wrapping a leg around his hips and shifting to rub her core against his cock. She slipped her hands under his leather jacket and into his trousers, cupping his arse and holding him in place. He ground against her. After a moment, after a fantastic, glorious moment, he let go of her and broke away._

_At her questioning look, he shook his head and pulled her away from the column, spinning her until she stopped, face forward, against the mushroom-shaped thing. Her skirt hiked, revealing the fact that she wasn’t wearing knickers. She looked over her shoulder at him and gave him a cheeky grin._

_He unfastened his trousers, releasing his throbbing shaft._

_Still looking at him, she rested her hands on the edge of the top of the mushroom-thing. She was gorgeous: her blonde hair trailing down her back; the tip of her pink tongue peeking out from between her teeth; her ripe, round, perfect arse naked and tempting. The blue-green light from the column reflected off her skin, giving her an alien yet familiar appearance. He stepped between her legs, spread wide and inviting, and in one hard thrust, plunged himself into her to the hilt. She cried out, a sound that went straight to his groin._

_Leaning over her, he rested one large hand next to hers for leverage and cupped her soft, warm breast in the other—marveling at how perfectly it fit in his palm—before pulling partway out and pushing himself back into her softness. She pushed back against him._

_“Harder,” she moaned. “Faster.”_

_He didn’t need to be told twice. He plunged into her, harder and harder, over and over and over, panting against the back of her neck. Swearing, she urged him on, and he moved his hand from her breast to her clit, rubbing in time with his thrusts._

_“Mine,” he growled and moved his lips to her skin, licking and sucking before biting down, marking her as his and only his for all to see._

_She screamed in ecstasy, carrying him over, and after one more hard thrust, he stiffened over her, pulsing into her…_

“John?” 

He jerked back to the present, his cock already half hard, fueled by the vivid fantasy and the naked, willing woman in his arms. 

“Yeah?”

She poked him in the side. “You didn’t answer me. Any fantasies?”

“Oh, yeah,” he said. “But, like you said, wrong venue.”

He pressed against her, rubbing his growing erection against her thigh; her eyebrows shot up. “Already?” she asked.

He gave her a wicked grin. “I’m very impressive. And I’m going to show you just exactly how impressive I am.”

Her eyes lit up. “Oh, yeah?”

“Absolutely.” His eyes twinkled. “At least twice. Maybe more if you’re a very good girl.” 

He lowered his head to hers, capturing her lips with his.

And Rose’s phone rang.

He groaned.

“It’s probably just Mum. Ignore it,” she said, and pulled his head back to hers.

The phone rang half a dozen times before stopping. And then started again. Rose sighed.

“Your mum has the worst timing,” John told her.

“Tell me about it.”

To their relief, the phone stopped ringing again, but before he could kiss her again, his phone began to ring. They exchanged worried looks. He abruptly sat up, grabbed his jacket off the floor, and pulled his mobile out of his pocket. He glanced at the small display screen.

“It’s the garage,” he said in surprise. He flipped his phone open. “Hello?” He listened for a moment. “We’ll be right there.” He disconnected. Rose was already half dressed in a T-shirt and knickers.

“What is it?” she asked as she pulled on her jeans. 

“Abhirati’s alone in the garage,” he said, pulling on his jumper and a pair of jeans. “And her water just broke. She’s in labor.”

~oOo~

One floor down and one flat over, the credits for _The Quiet Man_ rolled on the small telly in the corner of the living room. 

“I love that movie,” Gladys said. 

“You just fancy John Wayne,” Irene answered. 

“And what’s wrong with that? He was a proper man: tall, broad-shouldered, handsome…”

“Bit too American for my taste.” Irene stood. “I could murder a cuppa. Want one, Gladys?”

“Do we have any more Jaffa Cakes?” Gladys asked hopefully.

“I think you ate the last one at lunch, love, but I’ll look.”

As Irene left the room, Gladys took the DVD out of the player and put it away on a small bookshelf next to the telly. The shelves were filled to capacity with their favorites, John Wayne movies (Irene was right—she did fancy him) and musicals for her, romantic comedies for Irene. She searched for a moment, looking for something else to watch. Nothing looked appealing. Perhaps something interesting would be on telly this evening, she thought. She turned off the DVD player. A commercial came on the screen, loudly advertising a baldness remedy. She winced. 

“Why are the commercials always louder than the shows?” she complained. She picked up the television’s remote control from an end table and pressed a small button near the top. Instead of decreasing, the sound surged, exploding out of the television’s speaker. Flustered, she jabbed at the button again, only succeeding in increasing the volume to deafening, earsplittingly painful levels. Below her, someone pounded and yelled in protest.

Irene rushed back into the room. She took the remote from Gladys’s shaking hands and pressed the correct button. The television quieted. “Are you all right?” she asked.

Gladys’s lower lip quivered. “I can’t even manage to work the telly properly anymore.”

Irene wrapped her arms around her sister. “It’s all right, love. It could happen to anybody, pressing the wrong button like that. Done it myself. Doesn’t mean anything.” 

Gladys nodded, pretending to believe her, but she knew the truth. She was getting worse, slowly to be sure, but she was definitely getting worse. Oh, it wasn’t pressing the wrong button on the remote control; Irene was right, anybody could do that. No, it was the confusion she sometimes felt, the nervousness that would come, and how flustered and scared she’d get when it happened. They both knew the time was coming when Irene wouldn’t be able to care for her anymore, but they never talked about it, as if ignoring the situation would make it go away. 

As Gladys sat back down in her favorite chair, the one closest to the wall, Irene changed the channel. Some young aspiring pop star came on the screen, singing a romantic ballad.

“There you go, Gladys. You like this one.” She paused and watched the screen for a moment. “Lovely voice she has, doesn’t she?” Gladys nodded. “Now you just sit and watch and I’ll be back in just a minute.” She picked up her pocketbook. 

“Where are you going?” Despite trying to keep her voice steady, anxiety crept in. The incident with the volume control had shaken her more than she realized.

“We’re out of milk, thought I’d go get a pint and some of your Jaffa Cakes. Won’t be more than a tick.” Irene paused, and a worried expression came across her face. “Are you going to be all right? I can go tomorrow instead.”

Gladys shook her head. The shop was on the ground floor of a building just across the courtyard; you could see it from the walkway outside the flat. “You go ahead. I’ll be fine.”

“Are you sure?” When she nodded, Irene looked relieved. She picked up her pocketbook. “Be back before you know it.”

As the door closed behind her sister, Gladys leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. The young woman truly had a wonderful voice, she thought, so soothing. And she got so tired by the end of the day. She felt herself drift off…

_“Well, look what the cat dragged in. Where the fuck ‘ave you been?”_

Gladys jerked awake. Chuck’s voice came, clear as a bell, through the thin wall separating their flat from his. He sounded like he was in the same room; he must be sitting right against the wall just as she was. That was the problem with these flats. You could hear everything that went on next door. The flat she’d shared with her last husband had been so much better than this one. But he’d squandered all their money, and when he died, she’d been forced to move in with Irene. Even with the little pension she and Irene received, they couldn’t afford better. Frankly, they were lucky to have this one. 

Someone answered, but this time the voice was muffled. She couldn’t make out a single word, not even if the speaker was male or female. She frowned, worried that Rita had come back. It wouldn’t surprise her; women did that every day, returned to their abusive, cheating boyfriends, no matter how badly they’d been mistreated, believing that somehow he’d changed, somehow this time would be different. She ought to know; her third husband had done the same thing, and it had taken her ten years before she’d thrown him out. 

If only Harold had lived, she mused wistfully. How different her life would have been. She’d met her first husband in school; it had been love at first sight for both of them. They’d only been nineteen when they’d married. Unfortunately, they’d never had any children. They had plenty of time, he’d said, but then he’d died; cancer had taken him much too young, leaving her a widow before she turned thirty. He’d been gone forty-five years now; the pain of losing him had faded, but she still missed him terribly, every single day.

She’d have to have a little talk with Rita, she thought. The young woman needed to find her own Harold; she shouldn’t settle for a wanker like Chuck. 

_“In the kitchen, where else would it be? Maybe I should keep it in the bathroom?”_ Even through the wall, Gladys could hear heavy sarcasm in Chuck’s voice. There was a pause, and then, _“Get me one too.”_

After another pause, Gladys heard a thump and the sound of a sofa creaking. In her mind’s eye she could see someone drop down on it to sit next to Chuck.

_“Gimme a fag.”_ To her relief, it wasn’t Rita; the voice was medium in pitch, not particularly high or low, but was clearly male. He’d be a tenor if he could sing, she thought. He sounded vaguely familiar, but she couldn’t place him.

_“Get it yerself. They’re right in front of you.”_ That was Chuck.

_“You live like a pig,”_ the man said.

_“You don’t like it, there’s the door. Move back in with your mum.”_

_“And put up with the whinging? ‘Where’ve you been? Did you get a job yet? Are you eating right? Have you changed your underwear?’ Fuck that.”_

There was another pause. _“So, where have you been?”_ Chuck asked eventually.

_“Up North. Liverpool.”_

_“What the fuck’s in Liverpool?”_

_“Nothin’. Not a single bloody thing. Spent weeks lookin’ for a job, but couldn’t find a damn thing. Instead it was all, ‘Thank you very much for your interest.’”_ The voice put on a heavy, overly-posh accent. _“‘Unfortunately we do not have anything that is suitable for your qualifications, but we’ll be certain to contact you if anything becomes available.’ It’s all that bitch Rose’s fault. If it wasn’t for her…”_

_“That’s nothin’. Every time I turn around, that fuckin’ twat of a boyfriend of hers is there, watchin’ me. An’ it’s all your fault. He thought it was me threatenin’ her…”_

_“Bitch deserved it, and you know it. You told me yourself that if it wasn’t for the two of ‘em, Rita’d still be here.”_

_“Yeah,”_ Chuck answered grudgingly.

_“One of these days that slag’s gonna get what’s comin’ to her.”_ Gladys shivered at the implied threat. _“Where the fuck’s the remote? God, you live like a pig. How can you find anything in here?”_

Suddenly the telly next door blared with random bits of conversation and songs as someone flipped through the channels. Finally it settled on some sort of match; the sounds of a crowd cheering drowned out her own telly. As she reached for the remote control, she heard the front door open.

“Gladys, I’m back,” Irene called. “They didn’t have the Jaffa cakes, so I got a box of assorted biscuits. Would you like some?” She entered the room, heavily laden with more than just biscuits and milk. “I also bought… What happened? What’s wrong?” she asked sharply.

Gladys shook her head, unable to articulate the feeling of foreboding that had come over her. She gestured at the wall. “I heard… they were swearing up a storm.”

“Is Rita back?”

“No, it sounded like two men: Chuck and someone else.”

Irene pursed her lips thoughtfully and stared at the wall. “It was probably nothing. Maybe Chuck had his telly on too loud.”

“I don’t think so… Maybe…” Gladys said slowly. Suddenly she wasn’t certain what she’d heard. “There was an awful lot of cursing.”

“Maybe he had that political show on,” Irene suggested. “You know, the one with that foxy older gent that swears all the time.”

Gladys smiled. “He may have a foul mouth, but he’s dead sexy.”

“Isn’t he though? I wouldn’t kick him out of bed.” Irene looked at the wall and frowned. “Chuck’s not watchin’ it now, though, is he? Sounds like American football’s on. Oh, well. How ‘bout that tea, love?”

Irene didn’t wait for an answer. As she left the room, Gladys grabbed the remote and turned up the volume. To her disappointment, the girl was gone. Now it was a young man dancing some sort of new-fangled dance. He was on the floor, spinning like a top. She tilted her head to the side as she watched, not quite sure what to make of it. It was odd, but he seemed good at it.

Another cheer came from the television in the flat next door, pulling her attention away from the dancer and back to the conversation she’d overheard. She stared at the wall, trying to remember the details of the conversation she’d overheard. Her memory was so bad these days. She was forgetting something, she just knew it. She just hoped it wasn’t something important.


	35. Chapter Thirty-Four

**Chapter Thirty-Four – London, 25 August, 2007**

In less than a minute, John and Rose were running down the concrete steps of Brandon House. As they raced across the courtyard that separated it from Bucknall House, they dodged the groups of loitering teenagers and young adults who had gathered here and there, standing on corners or sitting on steps, smoking and chatting while finalizing plans for the evening. 

Across the way, the corner shop was just closing, the owner locking the narrow door and flipping a dangling sign in the window to read ‘closed’. Two doors down the youth center was still open, its door ajar and music blaring from inside, but it was likely empty, as everyone on the estate seemed to be gathered in the courtyard, enjoying the clear, warm summer evening.

John led the way through the crowd, Rose on his heels, skirting around one group that were half blocking the entrance to the alley that led to the garage, and barely avoiding knocking into a couple in a clinch, before tearing down the narrow passageway, jeers from the teens following after them.

“Where’s the fire?” someone hollered, thinking himself clever, and his friends hooted with laughter. 

John reached the end of the alley first. He came to an abrupt halt, and Rose, unable to stop, plowed into him. Russell Road was packed: cars, trucks, motorcycles, all were at a standstill. Even the bus was stuck where it was, boxed in while in the process of pulling away from the stop, turn signal blinking, with a delivery van in front of it blocking its path, and another to its side in the lane. 

John craned his neck to see over the heads of the crowd on the pavement. Traffic was backed up as far as the eye could see. Even the cross streets were full. Beside him, Rose groaned.

He swore under his breath. “Saturday night. Typical London traffic.” 

“Tell me about it,” she said. “I grew up here.”

The light at the corner turned green, setting off a chorus of honking, but not a single vehicle moved. 

Directly across from them was the garage. The large bay doors were shut, and the heavy black iron security gate, discouraging theft and vandalism, had been pulled across the plate glass windows and customer entrance and padlocked, as it was every night when the garage was closed.

John scanned the area, calculating the quickest route across the road. After a moment, he grabbed Rose’s hand and darted between an ancient brown Dodge and a big yellow truck, dragging her along behind him until they reached the narrow door next to the main bay. He tried the handle, jiggling it a couple of times unsuccessfully, before pulling out his keys. As he unlocked the door and let them in, he called out to Abhirati. 

“I’m in the office,” she called back, and John was relieved to hear her voice was strong and clear.

They made their way through the silent garage to the office. Abhirati was standing in the center of the room, leaning against a mop, a bucket of water next to her. The office floor was gleaming. 

When she saw them, a look of relief crossed her face. “Thank God you’re here.”

“What are you doing?” Rose demanded. “You need to sit down.”

“Someone had to clean up the mess,” she answered, and it suddenly occurred to John that when her waters broke, they certainly would have sullied the floor. To someone as neat as Abhirati, that would have been intolerable, labor or no labor.

Rose took the mop from her and moved it and the bucket to the side of the room, while John wrapped an arm around her shoulders and led her to a chair in the waiting area. 

“How are you feeling?” he asked.

Abhirati took a deep breath and blew it out slowly before answering. “About how you’d expect someone would feel, nine months gone and in the middle of labor. I feel like crap.”

"How close are your contractions?" Rose asked as she joined them.

"Not sure. Pretty close together."

“Why didn’t you call for an ambulance?” 

“I knew you’d get here faster than they would,” Abhirati told her. “When I had Padma, my first child, it took the ambulance over an hour to arrive. I said to myself never again.” She paused, grimacing. “I'm sorry to bother you; I hope I didn't mess up your evening."

"Of course not," Rose assured her. "We're glad you called us."

“Where’s Mudali?” John asked.

“You know how badly Arthur wants to expand. He heard of a garage available in Ealing, and he and Bill went to look at it.” She winced, noisily sucking in air, and when she spoke, it was through clenched teeth. “He’s stuck in traffic.” 

“I can believe that,” Rose said, with a quick glance in the direction of the door. “Russell Road looks like a car park.”

“Rose, stay with Abhirati while I pull a car around,” John ordered. 

“You’re not going to get through that mess out there,” Rose told him. 

“Where there’s a will, there’s a way,” he answered confidently. “We’ll go out the back, cut through a couple of alleys….”

Abhirati shook her head and groaned. She wrapped her arms around her massive belly, hugging herself. “I don’t know if we’re going to make it.”

“Don’t worry. I'm not just an expert mechanic; you are looking at someone who is a master behind the wheel as well. We'll make it with time to spare.” He walked behind the office desk and scanned the pegboard that held the keys to all the vehicles currently at the shop. It wouldn’t do to put her in a car that would break down on the way to the hospital. Behind him, Abhirati gasped. 

“John, wait,” Rose said urgently. “I think Abhirati’s having the baby.”

“Yeah, thanks, got that, Rose,” he answered, as he debated between a full-sized Buick saloon car and a Honda Accord. The Buick would be a little more comfortable, but the Honda might be more maneuverable in traffic. “That’s why we’re here.” He grabbed the Honda's keys.

“No, I mean, I think she’s having it now!”

Dropping the keys, John spun around, alarmed as much by the tinge of panic in her voice as by her words. Abhirati was seated on the chair nearest the door, arms still wrapped around herself, gently rocking back and forth. She cried out again, her face contorted in pain, and Rose wrapped an arm around her, at once comforting and supporting her. In response, Abhirati blindly reached for her with one hand. The two women clasped hands tightly.

John was suddenly, shockingly, hyper-aware of the scene in front of him: of the sounds of traffic, only slightly muffled, coming from the street; of the scent of ammonia from the newly washed floor not quite covering up the typical garage odors of petrol and motor oil; and of the light from the setting sun filtering in through the holes in the gate covering the plate glass window, making patterns on the floor. A beam of light struck Abhirati’s hair, and for the first time, he noticed it wasn’t jet at all, but that dark, rich brown that often masquerades as black. Tendrils had escaped the thick plait that she wore down her back, and the strands had taken on a life of their own, floating about her face.

Rose looked up, and her eyes met his. She opened her mouth to speak, and then abruptly shut it, as if she wasn’t sure what to say. 

But nothing needed to be said. He already knew. It was too late. Abhirati’s waters had already broken. Her contractions were obviously strong. Despite his assurances to the contrary, given the traffic, it was unlikely they’d make it to the hospital in time. 

They might not even make it out of the car park. 

Abhirati moaned again.

“Help her,” Rose pleaded.

He stared at Rose in disbelief. What could he do? Knowing a little about bruises and acupressure didn’t equate to a knowledge of childbirth. But she was looking up at him so confidently, so trustingly, so unwaveringly certain that he could handle this.

But she was wrong. He couldn’t. He wasn’t a doctor. He was just John Smith, auto mechanic, able to fix broken cars and backed up toilets and heating vents that had teddy bears shoved in them. He couldn't deliver a baby. 

A loud metal-on-metal crash came from outside, quickly followed by the sounds of deep male voices shouting obscenities. A woman screamed…

_The building behind him exploded in a fiery blast that lit up the night sky, causing a hailstorm of burning gravel to rain down from the heavens. As the acrid odor of high energy weapons fire assailed his nostrils, he tore down the war-torn street, screams of terror echoing in his mind and in his ears, dodging the rubble and debris that lay in his path and seeking somewhere, anywhere, to hide._

_Aided by the light of the inferno, he spotted a narrow alley some thirty yards in front of him and to the left. It was partially blocked from view by a hunk of smoldering concrete, ten feet high at its pinnacle, that had only minutes before been part of the building behind him. Perfect. He changed course. Within seconds, he was leaping over a chunk of granite and darting inside. He plastered himself against the wall, trying to disappear in the shadows, holding his breath, not daring even to breathe in fear that the enemy would pick up the sounds of the air expelling from his lungs or sense the increase of carbon dioxide coming from his exhalation._

_They were right behind him, were tearing the city apart, destroying everything in their path in their cold-blooded, relentless search for him. And they’d almost caught him this time. He’d been only seconds from extermination when something suddenly, miraculously distracted them, allowing him to escape. He’d never seen the source of their distraction, but he thanked the heavens—stars, moons, and planets—and all the gods of the Pantheon—every Pantheon, everywhere—for his escape._

_But he wasn’t out of the woods yet, not by a long shot, judging by the sounds of weapons fire. It was growing closer, and he weighed the risks of moving from his present location with staying where he was for the time being. If he stayed where he was, they’d probably find him eventually, but if he moved now, they’d definitely find him._

_From further down the alley came a whimper, muffled but distinct, startling him. He turned his head in the direction of the sound._

_Hidden deep in the shadows were two figures: a woman, crouched down and leaning against the building wall, and a young girl kneeling beside her. The woman was dressed incongruously for the location, in a ceremonial robe made of a heavy brocade, royal blue shot with gold. Her dark, thick hair hung in a plait down her back, and even from a distance he could see it had been intricately intertwined with gold thread. The girl was just as formally dressed, but in an old-fashioned gown made of lavender silk and trimmed in lace. But the woman’s robe had a large singe mark that began on one shoulder and trailed down the front of it, and the girl was filthy, her bobbed blonde hair a mess, her dress torn and stained._

_He raised a finger to his lips, and then pointed at the mouth of the alley. Wide-eyed, the girl glanced in the direction he had indicated, and then looked back at him. She nodded, understanding the need for silence. The woman beside her moaned quietly._

_Help her, the girl’s eyes pleaded._

_Frowning, he turned his attention to the woman, and realized in shock that she was heavy with child. Unusual enough among their people in times of peace, but shocking given the present state of affairs on this planet. More alarming, however, a pool of dark red liquid had formed beneath the woman and was rapidly spreading across the alley floor. His nostrils flared. Amniotic fluid—mixed with blood. Too much blood._

_He met the woman’s eyes. She shook her head, almost apologetically. Too late, she mouthed._

_“I’m sorry,” he whispered._

_With a high-pitched whine, a beam of light burst from the far end of the alley, followed quickly by a second…_

“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

A heavy metal door slammed shut in his mind, so hard that it left him reeling. He winced at the blinding jolt of pain that coursed through his head, his hands moving to his temples of their own accord. 

“John, help me with Abhirati.” 

“What?” He stared, trying to make sense of the scene in front of him. The vision— _memory?_ —had been so real, so vivid he could still smell the odors of ozone and burned flesh, but had faded so rapidly that he could scarcely recall any of the details.

Or anything at all actually.

He blinked. For instance, he had absolutely no idea who the women in front of them were, or what their relationship was to him.

Or even who he himself was. 

“John, please!” The young blonde woman’s voice was firm, bordering on demanding, yet still held hints of worry and fear. 

_Rose_ , he thought. _Her name is Rose._

The rest came back in a rush. He was in the office of the garage, and the owner’s wife, Abhirati Mudali, was about to give birth, possibly right here in the office. He still wasn’t sure who he was—but he remembered that that was par for the course—and he didn’t know how to deliver a baby.

And yet here he was. He’d better figure out, quick.

Shaking off what little remained of the odd vision, he rejoined the women on the other side of the room.

“Rose, call for an ambulance,” he said softly. As Rose moved to obey, John knelt beside Abhirati and took her hand. “You’re going to be just fine, you and the baby both.”

She nodded, looking up at him with the same amount of trust as Rose had earlier. If only he could be worthy of that trust.

He let go of her hand and reached out to touch her abdomen, but paused, his hand hovering inches over her belly.

"May I?" he asked.

She nodded again, and he gently placed his hand flat against her abdomen. It was soft, her current contraction over, and he could feel the babe within squirm under his touch. If only he knew what to do. And then, deep inside his brain, he felt something shift, rearrange itself, as if walls were being reconfigured. A door slid open. 

He didn’t know why, didn’t know how or where he’d gained the knowledge, but he knew what to do. He smiled. 

"You're going to be just fine," he said again. And this time he meant it.

~oOo~

Jimmy Stone stared at the ceiling, tracing the path of one of the cracks in the plaster as it travelled from one side of the room to the other. It began near the door and jutted straight out, before swirling and weaving its way across the room, finally coming to a stop about a foot before the door to the kitchen.

He loved being high.

He loved the feeling of bonelessness, of floating, of complete and utter relaxation that came with it. He loved how profound everything seemed, even a crack on the ceiling of a council estate flat. And he loved how it made his problems feel a million miles away. Marijuana was better than alcohol, better than coke, better than pills. The only thing better than pot was sex, and sometimes not even that. He had missed a lot of things while in prison—girls, his guitar, freedom—but what he had missed most was this.

Lazily, he lifted the spliff to his lips and took a long drag, savoring the pleasant burn of tobacco and marijuana as it traveled down his trachea and entered his lungs. He held it there—one, two, three—before slowly blowing it out in a long stream. In the background, as if in a dream, he heard cheering. 

Telly, he thought absently, and giggled.

"What's so funny?" Chuck asked, taking the spliff from him.

Jimmy gestured around the room expansively.

"My flat?" 

"No!" Then he looked around the room. "Yes." And burst out laughing. After a moment, Chuck joined in.

After his own drag on the spliff, Chuck handed it back. Instead of raising it to his lips, Jimmy became distracted by the thin trail of smoke that rose from its tip. It was sensual, the dance it did as it dissipated, joining the bluish gray haze that filled the room.

Dancing reminded him of music, music of his guitar, and his guitar...

He pinched out the burning tip and placed it in an ashtray on the coffee table.

"We should get the band back together."

"Wha..." Chuck stared at him as if he was speaking some other language, something completely unlike English. Icelandic maybe, or perhaps Urdu. "What are you on about?" 

Jimmy spoke slowly, as if to a two-year-old, because being high made Chuck stupid. Always had, ever since they were kids. "We should get the band back together."

"We can't."

“Sure we can,” he insisted. “I’m not working, your job is crap, what’s there to stop us?”

“Rita always said…”

“Who the fuck cares what Rita always said? Rita ain’t here. Listen, we call Chris and Reggie, do a few gigs here just to get the kinks out, then go to Blackpool or something. After that, we head to Berlin. They always do that festival there…” Chuck was shaking his head. “What?”

“Chris has got a job, a real one, at a bank or something. And I don’t know where Reggie is. Last I heard he was in Armagh.”

“Armagh? Where the fuck’s Armagh?”

“Northern Ireland.”

“Why the fuck’d he go there?”

Chuck shrugged. “Family or something.”

Jimmy thought for a moment. Then he shook his head. “Fuck ‘em. Fuck ‘em both. We don’t need ‘em. You can play bass, and drummers are a dime a dozen. We’ll just get a new one.” He leaned back, letting his head rest against the back of the sofa, and stared at the ceiling. He sighed. “Everything’s been so fucked, ever since that gig at The Starburst. Ever since Rose lost us that gig, everything’s been for shit.”

Chuck snorted. “ _Rose_ lost us that gig? Is that what you think? Rose didn’t lose us that gig.”

“What are you talking about? Reggie told me that Rose mouthed off to the owner’s wife and got us fired.”

“ _Reggie_ told you? _Reggie_ is the one who got us fired. You remember that girl they had workin’ there? You know the one, she bussed the tables, did the dishes, that kind of stuff?”

Jimmy thought hard, trying to remember. There had been a girl, tall, skinny… “Yeah,” he said slowly. “I think so. What was her name, Trish, Tiffany?”

“Tina.”

“Yeah, that’s right! Tina! What about her?”

“She and Reggie had a thing goin’ on. Only turns out, she was the daughter of the owner. _And_ she wasn’t seventeen like she told him. More like fourteen. They got caught comin’ out of the storage room. Reggie said he was lucky we just got fired. Five minutes earlier, they would have been caught half-naked and shaggin’ against the wall, and he’d have ended up in hospital.”

“Twat. I’d have put him in hospital if I’d known.” 

“Guess that’s why he told you it was Rose’s fault. You do have a bit of a temper.”

“You should talk. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.” He laughed humorlessly. “All this time I blamed Rose. I guess I owe her an apology.”

“Too late for that now. That was all years ago. Nobody gives a shit anymore. Reggie’s gone, Rose’s shacked up with that boyfriend of hers…”

Jimmy sat up abruptly. “What? Rose is livin’ with that old man? I thought she was livin’ with her mum.”

“Nah. Didn’t you know?”

Jimmy shook his head. “I knew they were hangin’ out together. Didn’t know they were actually seein’ each other, let alone livin’ together.” 

“Seriously? It’s been all over the estate for weeks. Where’ve you been?”

“Liverpool,” Jimmy reminded him.

“Oh yeah, right. You told me that.”

“Wow. Rose is screwin’ that old man. What the fuck does she see in him?”

“Dunno. Maybe he’s a good lay.”

Jimmy snorted. “He’d have to be. She certainly can’t be seein’ him for his looks.”

Chuck laughed. “Too right there.”

With a sigh, Jimmy sat back, thinking of Rose. Looking back, things hadn’t been that bad with her, particularly in the early days. She’d been fun to be around, almost always able to make him laugh with a joke or a sarcastic comment whispered under her breath. And when she dressed up, she was drop dead gorgeous. She outclassed everyone in the club whenever they performed. 

Why the hell had he left her? And for that slag Noosh of all people?

~oOo~

“All right, we’re almost there,” John said. “The baby’s head is crowning.” He glanced up at Abhirati’s face. She looked worn out, exhausted, beads of perspiration dotting her forehead and running down her face from the exertion, and causing her hair to stick oddly to her skin. “How are you doing? You okay?” She nodded. “Just rest for a second. Couple more pushes and we’re done. Let me know when you feel the next contraction begin.” 

He glanced at Rose, who was seated behind Abhirati on the floor, propping her up. A pile of brand new shop towels, fresh out of their plastic wrappers, lay flat beneath them, serving to both soften the hard surface and absorb all the fluids that came with birth. 

Rose gave him an encouraging smile, one he returned.

“Okay, with this next push, Abhirati, I want you to grab your knees and pull on them, and Rose, you push against Abhirati’s back as hard as you can. Got it?” he asked.

Both women nodded.

“It’s starting,” said Abhirati breathlessly.

“Okay, on three. One, two, three, now push!”

Abhirati screamed with the effort, pushing as if a life depended on it, which of course it did. The baby’s head emerged from the birth canal. 

“Okay, okay, stop, stop for a second.” The cord was loosely looped around the baby’s neck. John slid a finger underneath it and slipped it over the baby’s head. “Okay, the baby’s head is out. One or two more hard pushes and he’ll be here. Ready?” At Abhirati’s nod, “Push!”

With another gush of liquid, the baby slipped out. John caught him neatly in one large hand and wiped him down with a fresh rag. “Oh, good job, Mum! Fantastic! You have a little baby boy.” With a syringe from the emergency medical kit Rose had retrieved earlier, he cleared the baby’s mouth and nasal passages. The baby began to cry. “Oi, what’s all this fuss? Your mum will feed you in just a tic. She’s just a bit busy at the moment.” He glanced up at Abhirati, who smiled weakly at him. “Almost done. Just need to deliver the afterbirth and you’re good to go.” He winked at her. “All set?” Another push and the placenta was delivered. Thankfully intact, since that meant there was less of a risk of hemorrhaging. 

“Do you need something to cut the cord?” Rose asked.

John shook his head. “No. As clean as Abhirati keeps this place, it’s still not a sterile environment. Instead, we’ll just wrap it and the placenta up with the baby,” he said, as he did just that, “And we’ll let the medics handle it when they get to the hospital.” He handed the precious bundle to Abhirati, as the sound of a door opening in the garage echoed into the office. “And here they are now.”

But it wasn’t. Instead, it was Arthur Mudali who rushed into the room. 

“Oh, thank God. I called the hospital, and they said you weren’t there, so I came straight…” He broke off as he caught sight of his wife, holding their new baby. “I missed it? He’s here?”

“And he’s perfect, absolutely perfect, Arthur,” John said.

Arthur turned to stare at him, an undecipherable look on his face. “And you…”

“John delivered the baby,” said Abhirati. “He and Rose both.”

“All I did was catch,” John said. “It’s your wife that did all the hard work. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go wash up.” 

When he returned to the office from the toilet, face and hands freshly scrubbed, the paramedics were there, helping Abhirati into a wheelchair. Predictably, Arthur was instructing them on how best to do it.

Rose stood to the side of the room, trying to stay out of the way. She was holding the baby, looking down at him in wonder. At the sight, something niggled at the back of his mind, just out of reach. 

As if she could tell he was there, she looked up. And with her smile, the world lit up. He smiled back. 

Once Abhirati was settled, Rose handed the baby to her. 

“Thank you,” she said. “Thank you both. For everything.”

“We can’t thank you enough,” said Arthur. “Anything you want, just name it.”

“Maybe a day off,” John joked.

Mudali laughed. “You’ve got it.”

“And I know you’ve already met,” Abhirati interjected. She glanced at her husband, who smiled. “But John, Rose, we’d like you both to meet… Adri John Mudali.”

John stared at them open-mouthed. “Seriously?” At their nods of confirmation, “I don’t know what to say. I’m honored. I’m truly, truly honored.”

And a slim hand, feminine and oh, so familiar, slipped into his and squeezed. 

~oOo~

The match having ended, Chuck was now playing a video game. It was one of the racing ones, with odd cartoonish creatures driving around impossible tracks—ones that involved driving up waterfalls or through volcanos or some such—and in which other characters set up road blocks along the way. He’d offered to play it in two player mode, but Jimmy said no. Not only was he uninterested in playing himself—he usually won so the games bored him—but he couldn’t even be arsed to watch. Instead, like an old fashioned broken record, his thoughts returned over and over to what Chuck had told him about Rose, about how Rose hadn’t been responsible for the loss of the Starburst gig, and particularly how she was shacked up with that mechanic from the garage.

What the hell did she see in him? It wasn’t looks, that was for damned sure, and it certainly wasn’t money, not if he worked at the garage. And despite what Chuck had said, it couldn’t be sex either—after all, the man was _old_. He’d be surprised if they shagged at all. 

“That bloke, what’s his name again?” 

“Which bloke?” Chuck didn’t bother to look at him, so engrossed as he was in what was happening on the screen.

“The one Rose’s going with.”

“John Smith. I told you that.”

“Yeah, right.” Then, after a moment, “Does he live out on Davies?”

“Nah, he’s right here, in this building. Thought you knew that.” Chuck shook the controller in his hands, convinced, Jimmy knew, that it improved his game. Which it never did. “One up, and two over. Why?” Something exploded on the screen, so maybe it did this time.

“No reason. Just, my mum lives out there, and before I left for Liverpool, I used to see Rose a lot over by Davies Street, you know, where it crosses the High Street. At the time, I figured she was seein’ someone out there. Since you told me she’s livin’ with that bloke, I reckoned maybe that’s where they live.”

“Nope. They’re right upstairs.” There was another explosion on the screen, and Chuck swore. “Damn. No more lives. Gotta start over.” In a huff, he threw the controller down. It landed in a pile of dirty clothes and bounced once before rolling off the laundry and under the sofa. “What’s with all the questions about Rose and John?”

Jimmy shrugged and looked away. “Dunno. No reason in particular,” he said evasively. 

Chuck shook his head in disgust. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were jealous. I don’t get you. Three weeks ago, you’re writing angry notes to her and leavin’ them at her mum’s, half an hour ago you hated her guts, and now you want to know where she and her boyfriend live. You’re obsessed.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Then what was with all the notes? Notes I caught hell over?”

“I was pissed off. And drunk.”

“So you left notes? Why didn’t you just go talk to her?”

“Have you seen her mum? Last time I saw Jackie, she told me she’d have my left nut if I came anywhere near Rose again.”

Chuck snorted. “Yeah, that sounds like Jackie Tyler.”

“What about you?” Jimmy demanded. “You’re on my case for writin’ notes to Rose—didn’t you tell me you wrote a couple to John, tellin’ him to back off of you and Rita?”

Chuck had the grace to look sheepish. “Maybe.” He stood up abruptly. “I need a drink. You want somethin’?”

He thought about Rose, wondered what she was doing, if she was shagging John even as they spoke, in their flat on the floor above, right over their heads…

“Absolutely.”

~oOo~

Later, much later, John and Rose let themselves back into their flat. They had stayed behind to clean up the office, binning the rags and mopping the floor, before locking up and heading home. On their way, they stopped by the takeaway on the corner and picked up Chinese, both being ravenous after missing dinner but far too exhausted to cook after the eventful evening.

After eating, they tidied up. Since they’d had takeaway, that mostly consisted of throwing out a couple of cartons and washing a couple of forks. Rose also put a dish of tuna down for the cat, who wasn’t there. When he asked about it, she informed him that she had no intention of getting up early to feed the cat breakfast and this way she could sleep in undisturbed. 

Finally, they climbed into bed, Rose in her familiar bananas-in-nightcaps sleep shirt. She snuggled into his side. 

“Now, where were we when we were so rudely interrupted?” he asked jokingly.

“I believe you were telling me just how impressive you were,” she said. “In fact, you were promising to demonstrate your impressiveness.” She reached up and gave him a lingering kiss.

“Twice,” he said when they broke apart.

“Twice?”

“I think I promised to impress you twice.”

She yawned. “Maybe, but not tonight. I’m absolutely knackered.” She yawned again. “That was incredible, wasn’t it?”

“What was?”

“Helping Abhirati deliver her baby like that. I never thought I could ever help anyone like that, not here on the estate I mean.”

“It was something, wasn’t it?” he said absently. His mind had returned to the sight of Rose holding the baby, and the look of wonder on her face. “Sure makes you think.”

“Yeah,” she said quietly. 

“You ever think about us… I mean, I never thought about it, hadn’t occurred to me, but we haven’t been…”

“Oh! You don’t have to worry about that!” she said in a rush. “I got the implant, couple of years ago. Should still be good for a while yet, I should think.” She kissed him on the cheek and snuggled back down into his side.

“Oh,” he said. “Oh, good. Fantastic. Glad that’s all sorted.”

But in his mind’s eye, he saw Rose with a babe, his baby, in her arms. And instead of relief, what he felt was a wave of disappointment.


	36. Chapter Thirty-Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those keeping score, for plot reasons I've played a tiny bit with the timeline, as well as with the geography of the island that the Doctor and Mickey are on. Otherwise, I've tried to be true to the history of the event. Many thanks to Simon Winchester (the author of _Krakatoa: The Day the World Exploded_ ), to Charles River Editors (authors of _The 1883 Eruption of Krakatoa_ ), and Wikipedia, as well as a variety of other books, videos, and websites on volcanoes, Krakatoa, and Indonesia in general. Any errors are my own.
> 
> Thanks also to all of you who have stayed with this story, particularly all of you who have commented or left kudos on it. Because of a variety of RL reasons, I haven't always been able to respond to comments, but I read them all, and I am always grateful for them.
> 
> Kudos and virtual Jammie Dodgers to anyone who can identify the real life island the Doctor and Mickey are on.
> 
> Lastly, with this chapter, we are entering (approximately) the final third of the story. I hope to wrap it up soon. *crosses fingers*

**Chapter Thirty-Five - Indonesia, 25 August, 1883**

"Well, the good news is, we're not on Krakatoa," said the Doctor.

After hours of tramping through the forest, and climbing what felt to Mickey like Mount Everest, they'd finally emerged from the trees onto a wide, grassy plateau. From their new vantage point, it was clear they were on an island, or at the very least a peninsula, because bright, shimmering water, glowing red from the setting sun, surrounded them to the front and either side. Directly ahead, to the north, small misty patches of brown and green emerged from the water at the horizon. To the east, the open sea was visible through the small stand of palm trees that jutted out into the clearing from the forest behind them.

But to the west...

Across a narrow strait, only a couple of miles away from where they were, lay another island. Unlike the lush, vivid green of the island they currently occupied, it was black and gray and appeared completely lifeless. A huge, forbidding mountain dominated the far end of the island, a single, thin column of smoke trailing upwards from its peak. On the near end, three smaller cone-shaped hills formed a line from the island's midpoint to its northern shore.

A slight breeze picked up, gently blowing the grass and the leaves of the trees, and carrying with it the scents of sulfur and ash.

"And the bad news?" Mickey asked, although he already knew the answer.

The Doctor answered anyway. "We're still far too close."

"Do you still have those opera glasses from Dallas?"

Through the opera glasses, the nightmarish island looked even more horrific. A thick layer of ash covered every surface, and there were at least a dozen places where steam rose from vents in the ground; dead tree stumps rising from the ash were the only things that hinted at the island ever having different past.

"I don't understand, are we too late?" Mickey asked. "Did the volcano already blow?"

The Doctor shook his head. "Krakatoa began erupting several months prior to the main explosion. The main explosion was so powerful, it blew away most of the island. Since the island's still there…"

"Since the island's still there, it hasn't happened yet."

The sonic screwdriver whirred as the Doctor began to scan in the direction of the volcano. Then he pointed the screwdriver at the ground. Mickey frowned. Ever since they'd arrived here, the Doctor had been doing that regularly, scanning not just the surrounding area, but the ground as well. After about the fifth time, Mickey had asked about it and had been told that he was monitoring the magma underneath their feet. Since then, every time he did it, it had struck Mickey that they were only days, perhaps only hours, away from one of the largest explosions in human history. And of course they were right on top of it.

Typical.

After the Doctor examined the readings he got from his scan of the ground, he began to scan the area around them in a long, sweeping arc. He stopped when it was pointed over the open water to the north.

"Opera glasses," he said, hand extended. Mickey handed them back.

After a moment of staring through them, the Doctor shook his head.

"Still not high enough," he muttered.

"What are you lookin' at?" Mickey asked.

Instead of answering, the Doctor pocketed both his opera glasses and the sonic screwdriver and crossed to one of the palm trees. He shimmied up its narrow trunk and then leapt, landing neatly in the crown of its neighbor. Both trees swayed, as did the Doctor, but somehow he managed to retain his footing.

"And you used to call me an ape," Mickey said under his breath.

"What was that?" the Doctor called down from his perch.

"Nothin'," Mickey answered, slightly embarrassed at being overheard. "Just wondering what you were lookin' at."

"Just a tic."

The Doctor leapt again and again, from treetop to treetop, until he reached the last of the palms. Then, balanced precariously on the very top of the tree, he again peered out over the water through the opera glasses.

Mickey laughed. Standing there on the top of a palm tree in the middle of a tropical rainforest like that, the Doctor looked a bit like Tarzan. Well, if Tarzan had suddenly taken to using opera glasses and wearing a pinstriped suit.

Clearly still dissatisfied at what he could see through the opera glasses, after a moment the Doctor exchanged them for a spyglass he pulled from an interior pocket of his jacket. With the spyglass in hand, he no longer looked like Tarzan, he looked like Captain Jack.

Sparrow, not Harkness.

Mickey sighed. Even he had to admit, grudgingly and only to himself, that the Time Lord cut a dashing figure, particularly silhouetted as he was against the sunset.

With a flash of insight that was almost painful, Mickey realized he'd never had a chance with Rose, not really, not since the Doctor had entered their lives. He was larger than life, grander and more impressive than anything planet Earth could produce. How could he, how could any human, compete with that? He'd just been kidding himself to think that after traveling with the Doctor, Rose would ever be content to return to the estate and settle down with him.

The Doctor returned the spyglass to his pocket and returned the way he came, leaping from the top of one tree to the next. To Mickey's surprise, when he reached the tree he had originally climbed, instead of returning to the ground he continued on, jumping to a tall tree with large, round leaves. From there he grabbed a vine belonging to the next tree in line and used it to swing Tarzan-like to a thick branch that was too far even for him to jump to.

Mickey shook his head. "Now you're just showing off."

The Doctor scrambled up the branches of the tree and disappeared into the dense foliage near the top. "Ha! Mickey, come here!"

"Not bloody likely." Mickey wasn't particularly afraid of heights, but there was no way he was following the Doctor up a tree. Instead, he followed the Doctor from the relative safety of the ground, squinting up at the canopy, searching for a glimpse of brown pinstripes amongst the broad green leaves. "Where are you?"

"Heads up!" the Doctor called, and several large reddish fruits unexpectedly fell from the top of one of the trees. Despite being startled by the sudden rain of produce, Mickey still managed to catch them neatly in outstretched arms. As he placed them gently on the ground, there was a rustling of leaves high overhead.

"Incoming!"

This time a half a dozen pale yellow fruits fell. These were followed by a number that were star-shaped, some that were shocking pink and covered with long green hairs, and two hard green ones that were covered in spikes. As he dove to catch those, a third struck him on the top of his head.

"Ow!" he protested.

"Sorry!"

Mickey placed the green fruit he had caught next to the growing pile of food already on the ground and then rubbed his head where he'd been hit. With a quiet thud, the Doctor dropped out of the tree and landed next to him. In his arms, he held a large bunch of bright yellow bananas.

"Dinner is served," he said, grinning. After adding the bananas to Mickey's pile, he plopped down next to it and began pulling a variety of things from his pockets: a dozen brown pear-shaped scaly fruits, the flask from earlier, a small sheathed knife, and what appeared to be a paper bag of sweets. As Mickey sat down next to him, the Doctor passed the knife to him and pulled out his sonic screwdriver. "Some of this, well, most of it, will need to be peeled."

Mickey shrugged. "No meat, no chips, but it's not the worst tea I ever had."

"I would imagine not," the Doctor said dryly. "I've eaten at Jackie's too."

Mickey laughed. "So, what is all this stuff? I mean, the star fruit and the bananas I know, got that at Tesco's, but what's this?" He picked up one of the scaly brown fruits.

"Not sure what everything is, so you'd better let me taste things first, but that one's salak, otherwise known as snake fruit. Safe for humans. Picked it when we first got here. It was growing near the TARDIS, and I figured we might get hungry. Needs to be peeled."

"Ow!" Mickey thrust an injured finger into his mouth.

"Be careful. The scales are very sharp," said the Doctor.

"Thanks for the warning."

Despite the unfamiliar flavors and textures, most of the fruit was delicious, although after tasting it the Doctor told Mickey not to eat the red ones— "Not poisonous per se, but would play havoc on a human's intestinal track," said the Doctor. "Lovely," Mickey replied, wrinkling his nose.—and despite the Doctor raving about the exquisite flavor of the pink ones, Mickey couldn't bring himself to try anything quite that hairy.

"When you were up the tree, what were you looking at?" Mickey asked as he grabbed a second banana.

"I found his TARDIS."

"Yes! Now we're getting somewhere!"

"Well, yes and no. It's about ten miles that way." He pointed in the general direction of the clearing.

"So he's, what, on the mainland or something?"

In response, the Doctor picked up a couple of bananas. He set one down on the ground. "This is Sumatra. It's an island in the Indian Ocean. And this…" He set the other down a few inches away, end to end, "This is Java. And this, right here…" He picked up one of the spiky green fruits and set it down a distance away. "This is Krakatoa. It's in the strait between the two islands. This is not to scale, of course, because Sumatra and Java are huge islands in comparison to Krakatoa. If I was doing this to scale, Krakatoa would be more the size of a pea, sitting between the two bananas. Well, maybe not the size of a pea, maybe more of a poppy seed…" His voice trailed off and he looked thoughtful. After a moment, he shook his head vigorously. "Anyway…" He picked up one of the hairy fruits and set it next to "Krakatoa". "This is us. We're on an uninhabited island just off the coast of Krakatoa. Now from the readings I got from the sonic screwdriver, the TARDIS is here." He set another of the hairy fruits down on his makeshift map, this time between "Krakatoa" and "Sumatra".

"So, what's there?"

"I don't know. I couldn't quite make it out, not in this light, and I'm not that familiar with the geography of this area. I'm guessing there's another island there. Otherwise, the TARDIS is just floating around out there in the strait. Unlikely, but it wouldn't be the first time."

Mickey stared at the map thoughtfully. Their TARDIS wasn't working, and there was no way he could see to get to the other TARDIS and the other Doctor. They couldn't walk, they couldn't swim—maybe the Doctor could, but he certainly couldn't, not that far—and if the island they were on was uninhabited, they couldn't take a boat.

"So now what? Do we build a raft?"

"Build a raft?" the Doctor said disbelievingly. "What good would that do?"

"I dunno," Mickey said defensively. "Jus'… somethin'. We can't just sit around here waiting for the volcano to explode."

"No, I suppose not."

They both fell silent.

"We could go back to the TARDIS," the Doctor suggested. "I don't think she'll get into the Vortex, but I may be able to repair her enough to fly her out of here. Even if I can't, if we're inside her, she'll shield us from the blast."

"Then what?"

The Doctor shrugged.

"How long have we got till…" Mickey made an exploding gesture with his hands.

"Not sure. That's the funny thing about all of this. The magma level hasn't grown since we got here. I would have expected it to be growing exponentially at this point, leading to an explosion of catastrophic proportions, but it seems to have stabilized. As it stands right now, unless something drastically changes, I'd say we are weeks away from a major eruption."

"Weeks?"

"If not months."

"Months?"

The Doctor shrugged again.

Mickey shook his head. "That can't be right. I mean, we know he was at Krakatoa when it exploded, and it's right over there." He gestured in the general direction of the clearing.

"It's more like that way," said the Doctor, pointing a little to the left of where Mickey had indicated.

"Whatever. The point is, we were following him, and he's already here. Yeah, I know what you said about the slingshot," he said when the Doctor opened his mouth to correct him. "But still. There's Krakatoa, and there's him. So how could we be months away from the explosion?"

"I don't know. But the magma levels don't lie."

"But we felt the earthquakes, when we first got here. You said yourself that they were, what, a harbinger of things to come or something?"

"And when was the last time you felt one?" asked the Doctor. Mickey thought for a moment. He couldn't remember. "It's been over four hours. It's not unusual for areas of high volcanic activity to have small earthquakes, whether an eruption is imminent or not. With a major eruption, I'd expect them to get steadily worse, but it's not unheard of for them to stop shortly before an eruption either."

"So, what you're saying is that we can't go by the earthquakes to predict when the eruption is going to happen."

"Nope."

The Doctor picked up one of the scaly snake fruits and began to sonic its outer hull. One by one, the scales slowly curled and dropped off, revealing its pale, creamy flesh underneath. Mickey watched for a moment before turning his attention to their surroundings. In the few short minutes that they'd been talking, the sun had set. Shadows had lengthened and merged, creating a wall of darkness only a few yards from where they sat. There was no way they'd be able to make it back down the mountain now.

As if the Doctor could read his thoughts, he said, "We'll have to camp here for the night."

"Camp?" Mickey asked. Images of tents and sleeping bags sprang to mind, and he wondered briefly just how large the Doctor's pockets were.

"Well, I say camp… It'll be more a question of us hanging around up here until it's light enough to head back to the TARDIS."

Somewhere in the darkness, Mickey could hear the quiet sound of wings flapping against air. He turned toward the sound, but could see nothing but tree branches silhouetted against the night sky. "Here?"

"Problem?"

Mickey stared into the shadows. "Nah, it's just… shouldn't we start a fire or something?"

"Why? Are you cold?"

"No, to keep wild animals away."

The Doctor snorted, and Mickey shot him a look. "Excuse me if I don't want to get eaten in my sleep. We're in the middle of the jungle here. There could be lions, or tigers..."

"Or bears?"

"Shut up."

"Mickey Smith, you are not going to get eaten by a lion or a tiger."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Because in the last six hours I have scanned this island at least a dozen times, and the largest animal on it is a rabbit."

Mickey laughed despite himself. "Well, I guess we're all right then. Unless it's that rabbit from Monty Python."

"Which rabbit is that?" asked the Doctor.

"Oh, man, are you seriously telling me you've never seen Monty Python and the Holy Grail?"

The Doctor shook his head.

"But you do know what Monty Python is, yeah?"

"Comedic troupe on telly in the early '70s, correct?"

"Close enough. So after their television show was over, they did some films, yeah? And in one of them, they played King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, and they were looking for the Holy Grail, and they ran into this rabbit. And, spoiler alert, you know the Slitheen? They didn't have nothin' on that rabbit…"

~oOo~

The Doctor leaned his head back against the trunk of a tall palm tree and closed his eyes. Nearby, Mickey was stretched out, flat on his back and jaw slack, quietly snoring.

They had spent several surprisingly enjoyable hours that evening. Over cards played by torchlight, Mickey recited the plot to every Monty Python skit he could remember, complete with dialogue, and then branched out into the storylines of a number of wildly implausible science fiction films. The Doctor, not wanting to be topped in the tall tales department, had continued in the same vein, telling Mickey a few stories himself, of his own interactions with Sontarans and Judoon, of the Yeti and real-life vampires, only slightly embellished.

Eventually, when Mickey could no longer hide his yawning, the Doctor suggested they both get a bit of shut-eye, hinting that he could do with a quick kip himself. It was a lie, he wouldn't need to sleep again for at least another couple of weeks, but it was for the younger man's benefit. He strongly suspected that Mickey was trying to stay awake out of some sort of primitive need to compete with the Doctor on a physical level. Ridiculous, of course, Time Lords were far superior physically to humans, but understandable given their history with each other and Mickey's past relationship with Rose. He himself rarely felt the need to compete with others.

He sighed. Another lie, this one boldfaced, and what's more, to himself. He'd always had a fairly casual relationship to the truth, seeing the occasional falsehood as a tool to use as a means to an end, to defeat an enemy or to calm the nerves of a frightened companion, but since when did he feel the need to lie to himself?

Perhaps it was a failing of this regeneration, as were his tendency to be rude and his lack of ginger hair. Well, there was nothing he could do about his hair color – he refused to consider artificial gingerness – but he could watch out for the lack of self-honesty.

Perhaps Rose could help him with that. She already was helping him in the rudeness department.

At the thought of his absent companion, he felt a wave of emotion, an odd mix of happiness, joy, loneliness and longing that he couldn't put a name to.

Another lie. He knew exactly what it was. He was just afraid to admit it.

Afraid? Perhaps Mickey was right. Perhaps he was a coward.

Was that another failing of this regeneration? Cowardice? Because he felt certain his previous regeneration would have been brave enough to admit it. Eventually. After all, he'd even kissed her—admittedly to take the Vortex out of her, but still—and given his life for her. On a scale from one to ten, that had to be an eleven in the bravery department.

On the other hand, by dying, that regeneration didn't have to face losing her, didn't have to face living on without her after she was gone. Not like he—

He gasped as a wave of pain shot through him.

"Are you all right?" Mickey asked.

The Doctor hesitated for a moment before responding, just long enough to be certain the pain wasn't reflected in his voice. "I'm fine. I thought you were asleep."

"I was, but then I heard you cry out."

"I did not—" he denied, and then doubled over as another wave of pain overtook him. He hissed and clutched his chest.

Mickey was at his side in an instant. "You are not all right."

"What is it about humans," the Doctor said through gritted teeth. "You all always feel the need to state the incredibly obvious."

"Is lying to my face about being okay a Time Lord thing, or is it just you?" asked Mickey, but his face was full of concern.

The Doctor took a deep breath and through pursed lips blew it out slowly. And again. And again. Gradually, the pain receded, then disappeared. "Just me. Although, as I'm the last of the Time Lords, it would seem to be one and the same."

"What was that?"

"Not sure. Could be that the time poison that is affecting the TARDIS is beginning to affect me, or…"

"Or what?"

"Or something happened that is affecting my past. Last time I felt anything like this, whole sections of my past were being ripped out of time."

"What could do something like that?"

"Well, back then some of my previous regenerations were being scooped out of their proper time stream by a rogue Time Lord."

"So, not likely here."

"Last of the Time Lords, so… nope."

Mickey stared at him, considering. "Are you all right now?"

"I think so." Truth, for a change.

"Has that happened before?"

"I just told you—"

"No. Recently. Have you had an attack like that since all this started?"

It occurred to him to lie, but what was the point? "Yes. Twice. Once aboard the TARDIS, and then again right after we got here."

They both fell silent. The Doctor lay back with his hands behind his head. He could feel Mickey's eyes on him, watching him for any signs of another attack. This is why he lied about things like this. He was supposed to take care of his companions, not vice versa.

Eventually, Mickey gave up on his self-imposed mission of monitoring him and lay back down. They stared at the bits of sky visible between the leaves of the trees. The night was clear and quiet; the only sounds were those the two of them were making. High overhead, the stars twinkled.

"What do you think he's doin'?" asked Mickey eventually.

"I have no idea. Sleeping, possibly. It's been a couple of weeks since he regenerated, and I don't think he's stopped to rest since then. He's due."

"No. I mean, what do you think he's doin' here? I've been thinkin' about it, tryin' to figure it out. First he was at the Kennedy assassination. And he saved someone there. Then at the Titanic launch, he saved a whole family. What's next? And why here?"

"So, what you're saying is, you think he's going to try it again? Save someone else?"

"I dunno. It just… it just feels like he's buildin' up to somethin', yeah? Somethin' bigger, like maybe instead of just savin' a single person or a family, maybe he's gonna try and save a whole village."

The Doctor shook his head. "You don't think that occurred to me? The instant I realized that he was going to fixed points I wondered if he was going to try something like that. But it's not possible. Not here. And particularly not where he is right now."

"What do you mean?"

The Doctor sat up abruptly. "Mickey, how much do you know about Krakatoa?"

Mickey sat up as well. "Not a lot. It's a volcano. It exploded." He laughed humorlessly. "It's right over there."

"Krakatoa isn't just that one mountain. Essentially the entire island is the volcano," the Doctor told him. "Although it's been erupting off and on for months, it begins erupting almost continuously on 26 August, 1883, causing a small tsunami and sending a huge cloud of ash into the sky. The next morning, on 27 August, 1883, a series of four explosions occur. They trigger powerful shockwaves and tsunamis almost 100 feet high. The final explosion, at mid-morning, is so loud that it's heard over 3000 miles away. Later, it's estimated that just one explosion was as powerful as four thermonuclear bombs. Between the ash, the lava, the shockwaves, the earthquakes, and the tsunamis, over 36,000 people die, although some estimates put that number over 100,000."

"Whoa," Mickey breathed.

"If he were really here to try to save someone, or a family or a village, how would he do it? Where would they go? I don't know of anywhere in the region that wasn't affected. But let's say for the sake of argument that he was here to save someone. If he is, he's in the wrong place."

"Wrong place?"

"Most of the people who died, died from the tsunamis," the Doctor said. "If I wanted to save someone, I'd be on Java or Sumatra, encouraging people to stay away from the coast and get to higher ground. That would be their only chance of survival. But the TARDIS isn't on either one of those islands. Instead, it's out in the middle of the strait."

"So, if he's not trying to save people, what do you think he's doing here?" Mickey asked.

Instinctively, the Doctor looked towards the clearing, in the direction of his younger self's TARDIS. "I don't know. I just… don't know."


End file.
